From immigrant to inventor

FROM IMMIGRANT
TO INVENTOR

MICHAEL PUPIN

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FROM
IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

From a f'liotogya/'h, i ufyrii^lU by I ndcy'ivo^ni (j- I 'iitierwooti

MICHAEL PUPIN

FROM
IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

MICHAEL PUPIN

PROFESSOR or ELECTROMSCHANICS, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
NEW YORK ^. LONDON
1949

/A 3

Copyright, 1922, 1923, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

Printed in the United States of America

All rights reserved. No part of this book
may be reproduced in any form without
the permission of Charles Scribner's Sons

TO THE MEMORY OF

MY MOTHER

BG^UQ

PREFACE TO NEW EDITION

"From Immigrant to Inventor" has met with a recep-
tion which is certainly very gratifying. Evidently it
conveyed a message which was timely. Hundreds of
letters which I have received since the book was pub-
lished, eighteen months ago, convince me that the message
was particularly welcome to the youth of this country.
It was intended for them, and I am certainly happy in
the knowledge that it found in their hearts an enthusias-
tic response. Teachers of science and of religion have
also assured me that they, too, found in the book a wel-
come message, and urged that a less expensive edition of
it be published, so as to reach a much wider circle of
readers. This edition is a response to these earnest re-
quests. I hope that the new readers of this less expensive
edition will find in it just as welcome a message as the
readers of the older editions did.

Michael Pupin,

New York
August 1, 1925

PREFACE

Looking back over the development of this volume
throughout the year or more during which I have been
writing it, it seems to me that I cannot better express the
end I have had in view than to repeat here what I wrote
at the beginning of Chapter XI :

^'The main object of my narrative was, and still is,
to describe the rise of idealism in American science, and
particularly in physical sciences and the related indus-
tries. I was a witness to this gradual development; every-
thing that I have described so far was an attempt to
qualify as a witness whose testimony has competence
and weight. But there are many other American scien-
tists whose opinions in this matter have more competence
and weight than my opinion has. Why, then, should a
scientist who started his career as a Serbian immigrant
speak of the idealism in American science when there
are so many native-born American scientists who know
more about this subject than I do? Those who have
read my narrative so far can answer this question. I
shall only point out now that there are certain psycholog-
ical elements in the question which justify me in the be-
lief that occasionally an immigrant can see things which
escape the attention of the native. Seeing is beheving;
let him speak who has the faith, provided that he has a

message to deliver."

Michael Pupin.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGB

I. What I Brought to America 1

II. The Hardships of a Greenhorn .... 43

III. The End of the Apprenticeship as Green-

horn 72

IV. From Greenhorn to Citizenship and College

Degree 100

V. First Journey to Idvor in Eleven Years . 138

VI. Studies at the University of Cambridge . 167

VII. End of Studies at the University of Cam-
bridge 192

VIII. Studies at the University of Berlin . . 218

IX. End of Studies at the University of Berlin 247

X. The First Period of My Academic Career at

Columbia University 279

XI. The Rise of Idealism in American Science . 311

XII. The National Research Council .... 349

Index 389

FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA

When I landed at Castle Garden, forty-eight years ago,
I had only five cents in my pocket. Had I brought
five hundred dollars, instead of five cents, my immediate
career in the new, and to me a perfectly strange, land
would have been the same. A young immigrant such as I
was then does not begin his career until he has spent all
the money which he has brought with him. I brought
five cents, and immediately spent it upon a piece of prune
pie, which turned out to be a bogus prune pie. It con-
tained nothing but pits of prunes. If I had brought five
hundred dollars, it would have taken me a little longer to
spend it, mostly upon bogus things, but the struggle
which awaited me would have been the same in each case.
It is no handicap to a boy immigrant to land here penni-
less; it is not a handicap to any boy to be penniless when
he strikes out for an independent career, provided that he
has the stamina to stand the hardships that may be in
store for him.

A thorough training in the arts and crafts and a sturdy
physique capable of standing the hardships of strenuous
labor do entitle the immigrant to special considerations.
But what has a young and penniless immigrant to offer
who has had no training in any of the arts or crafts and
does not know the language of the land? Apparently

1

2 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

nothing, and if the present standards had prevailed forty-
eight years ago I should have been deported. There are,
however, certain things which a young immigrant may
bring to this country that are far more precious than any
of the things which the present immigration laws pre-
scribe. Did I bring any of these things with me when I
landed at Castle Garden in 1874? I shall try to answer
this question in the following brief story of my life prior
to my landing in this country.

Idvor is my native town ; but the disclosure of this fact
discloses very little, because Idvor cannot be found on
any map. It is a little village off the highway in the prov-
ince of Banat, formerly belonging to Austria-Hungary,
but now an important part of the kingdom of the Serbs,
Croats, and Slovenes. At the Paris peace conference, in
1919, the Rumanians claimed this province; they claimed
it in vain. They could not overcome the fact that the
population of Banat is Serb, and particularly of that part
of Banat where Idvor is located. President Wilson and
Mr. Lansing knew me personally, and when they were in-
formed by the Yugoslav delegates in Paris that I was a
native of Banat, the Rumanian argiunents lost much of
their plausibihty. No other nationality except the Serb
has ever lived in Idvor. The inhabitants of Idvor were
always peasants ; most of them were illiterate in my boy-
hood days. My father and mother could neither read nor
write. The question arises now: What could a penniless
boy of fifteen, born and bred under such conditions, bring
to America, which under any conceivable immigration laws
would entitle him to land? But I was confident that I
was so desirable an acquisition to America that I should
be allowed to land, and I was somewhat surprised that
people made no fuss over me when I landed.

The Serbs of Idvor from time immemorial always con-
sidered themselves the brothers of the Serbs of Serbia,

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 3

who are only a few gunshots away from Idvor on the south
side of the Danube. The Avala Mountain, near Belgrade
in Serbia, can easily be seen from Idvor on every clear day.
This blue and, to me at that time, mysterious-looking peak
seemed always like a reminder to the Serbs of Banat that
the Serbs of Serbia were keeping an eye of affectionate
watchfulness upon them.

When I was a boy Idvor belonged to the so-called mili-
tary frontier of Austria. A bit of interesting history is
attached to this name. Up to the beginning of the eigh-
teenth century the Austrian Empire was harassed by
Turkish invasions. At periodically recurring intervals
Turkish armies would cross her southern frontier, formed
by the Rivers Danube and Sava, and penetrate into the
interior provinces. Toward the end of the seventeenth
century they advanced as far as Vienna, and would have
become a serious menace to the whole of Europe if the
Polish king Sobiesky had not come to the rescue of
Vienna. It was at that time that Emperor Leopold I, of
Austria, invited Charnoyevich, the Serb Patriarch of
Pech, in old Serbia, to move with thirty-five thousand
picked families of old Serbia into the Austrian territory
north of the Danube and the Sava Rivers, to become its
guardians. For three hundred years these Serbs had been
fighting the Turks and had acquired great skill in this
kind of warfare. In 1690 the Patriarch with these picked
famines moved into Austria and settled in a narrow strip
of territory on the northern banks of these two rivers.
They organized what was known later as the military
frontier of Austria. 1690 is, according to tradition, the
date when my native village Idvor was founded, but not
quite on its present site. The original site is a very small
plateau a little to the north of the present site.

Banat is a perfectly level plain, but near the village of
Idvor the River Tamish has dug out a miniature canyon,
and on the plateau of one of the promontories of this

4 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

canyon was the old site of Idvor. It is connected to the
new site by a narrow neck. The old site was selected
because it offered many strategical advantages of de-
fense against the invading Turk. The first settlers of the
old village lived in subterranean houses which could not be
seen at a distance by the approaching enemy. Remnants
of these subterranean houses were still in existence when
I was a schoolboy in the village of Idvor, over fifty years
ago. The location of the original chiu-ch was marked by a
little column built of bricks and bearing a cross. In a
recess on the side of the column was the image of St. Mary
with the Christ Child, illuminated by a burning wick im-
mersed in oil. The legend was that this flame was never
allowed to go out, and that a religious procession by the
good people of Idvor to the old monument was sure
to avert any calamity, like pestilence or drought, that
might be threatening the village. I took part in many of
these processions to the old deserted village, and felt every
time that I was standing upon sacred ground; sacred be-
cause of the Christian blood shed there during the strug-
gles of the Christian Serbs of Idvor against the Turkish
invaders. Every visit to the old village site refreshed the
memories of the heroic traditions of which the village peo-
ple were extremely proud. They were poor in worldly
goods, those simple peasant folk of Idvor, but they were
rich in memories of their ancient traditions.

As I look back upon my childhood days in the village
of Idvor, I feel that the cultivation of old traditions was the
principal element in the spiritual life of the village peo-
ple. The knowledge of these traditions was necessary and
sufficient to them, in order to understand their position in
the world and in the Austrian Empire. When my people
moved into Austria under Patriarch Charnoyevich and
settled in the military frontier, they had a definite agree-
ment with Emperor Leopold I. It was recorded in an
Austrian state document called Privilegia. According to

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 5

this ancient document the Serbs of the mihtary frontier
were to enjoy a spiritual, economic, and poUtical auton-
omy. Lands granted to them were their own property.
In our village we maintained our own schools and our
own churches, and each village elected its own local ad-
ministration. Its head was the Knez, or chief, usually a
sturdy peasant. • My father was a Knez several times.
The bishops and the people elected their own spiritual
and political heads, that is, the Patriarch and the Voy-
voda (governor) . We were free and independent peasant
landlords. In return for these privileges, the people ob-
ligated themselves to render military service for the de-
fense of the southern frontiers of the empire against the
invading Turks. They had helped to drive the Turks
across the Danube, under the supreme command of Prince
Eugene of Savoy, in the beginning of the eighteenth cen-
tury. After the emperor had discovered the splendid
fighting qualities of the Serbs of the military frontier,
he managed to extend the original terms of the Privi-
legia so as to make it obligatory upon the military fron-
tiersmen to defend the empire against any and every en-
emy. Subsequently the Serbs of the military frontier of
Austria defended Empress Maria Theresa against Frederick
the Great; they defended Emperor Francis against Napo-
leon; they defended Emperor Ferdinand against the re-
bellious Hungarians in 1848 and 1849; and in 1859 and
1866 they defended Austria against Italy. The mih-
tary exploits of the men of Idvor during these wars
supphed material for the traditions of Idvor, which were
recorded in many tales and stirring songs. Reading and
writing did not flourish in Idvor in those days, but poetry
did.

Faithful to the old customs of the Serb race, the people
of Idvor held during the long winter evenings their neigh-
borhood gatherings, and as a boy I attended many of
them at my father's house. The older men would sit

6 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

axound the warm stove on a bench which was a part of
the stove and made of the same material, usually soft
brick plastered over and whitewashed. They smoked and
talked and looked like old senators, self-appointed guar-
dians of all the wisdom of Idvor. At the feet of the old
men were middle-aged men, seated upon low stools, each
with a basket in front of him, into which he peeled the
yellow kernels from the seasoned ears of com, and this kept
him busy during the evening. The older women were
seated on little stools along the wall; they would be spin-
ning wool, flax, or hemp. The young women would be
sewing or knitting. I, a favorite child of my mother, was
allowed to sit alongside of her and listen to the words of
wisdom and words of fiction dropping from the mouths of
the old men and sometimes also from the mouths of the
middle-aged and yoimger men, when the old men gave
them permission to speak. At intervals the young women
would sing a song having some relation to the last tale.
For instance, when one of the old men had finished a
tale about Karageorge and his historic struggles against
the Turks, the women would follow with a song de-
scribing a brave Voyvoda of Karageorge, named Hay-
duk Velyko, who with a small band of ;:jerbiaus de-
fended Negotin against a great Turkish army under
Moula Pasha. This gallant band, as the song describes
them, reminds one of the httle band of Greeks at Ther-
mopylae.

Some of the old men present at these gatherings had
taken part in the Napoleonic wars, and they remembered
well also the stories which they had heard from their
fathers relating to the wars of Austria against Frederick
the Great during the eighteenth century. The middle-
aged men had participated in the fighting during the Hun-
garian revolution, and the younger men had just gone
through the campaigns in Italy in 1859 and 1866. One
of the old men had taken part in the battle of Aspem,

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 7

when Austria defeated Napoleon. He had received a
high imperial decoration for bravery, and was very proud
of it. He also had gone to Russia with an Austrian divi-
sion during Napoleon's campaign of 1812. His name
was Baba Batikin, and in the estimation of the village
people he was a seer and a prophet, because of his won-
derful memory and his extraordinary power of descrip-
tion. His diction was that of a guslar (Serbian min-
strel). He not only described vividly what went on in
Austria and in Russia during the Napoleonic wars in
which he himself participated, but he would also thrill
his hearers by tales relating to the Austrian campaigns
against Frederick the Great, which his father upon his
return from the battle-fields of Silesia had related to him.
I remember quite well his stories relatmg to Karageorge
of Serbia, whom he had known personally. He called
him the great Vozhd, or leader of the Serbian peasants, and
never grew weary of describing his heroic struggles
against the Turks in the beginning of the nineteenth cen-
tury. These tales about Karageorge were always re-
ceived at the neighborhood gatherings with more enthu-
siasm than any other of his stirring narratives. Toward
the end of the evening Baba Batikin would recite some
of the old Serbian ballads, many of which he knew by
heart. During these recitations his thin and wrinkled
face would light up; it was the face of a seer, as I remem-
ber it, and I can see now his bald head with a wonderful
brow, towering over bushy eyebrows through which the
light of his deep-set eyes would shine like the light of the
moon through the needles of an aged pine. It was from
him that the good people of Idvor learned the history of
the Serb race from the battle of the field of Kossovo in
1389 down to Karageorge. He kept alive the old Serb
traditions in the village of Idvor. He was my first and
my best teacher in history.

The younger men told tales relating to Austrian cam-

8 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

paigns in Italy, glorifying the deeds of valor of the men
of Idvor in these campaigns. The battle of Custozza in
1866, in which the military frontiersmen nearly annihi-
lated the Italian armies, received a great deal of atten-
tion, because the men who described it had participated
in it, and had just returned from Italy. But I remember
that every one of those men was full of praise of Gari-
baldi, the leader of the Italian people in their struggles
for freedom. They called him the Karageorge of Italy.
I remember also that in my father's house, in which these
winter-evening gatherings took place, there was a colored
picture of Garibaldi with his red shirt and a plumed hat.
The picture was hung up alongside of the Ikona, the
picture of our patron saint; on the other side of the Ikona
was the picture of the Czar of Russia, who only a few
years before had emancipated the Russian serfs. In the
same room and hanging in a very conspicuous place all
by itself was a picture of Karageorge, the leader of the
Serbian revolution. The picture of the Austrian emperor
was not there after 1869 !

The Serb ballads recited by Baba Batikin glorified the
great national hero. Prince Marko, whose combats were
the combats of a strong man in defense of the weak and
of the oppressed. Marko, although a prince of royal
blood, never fought for conquest of territory. Accord-
ing to the guslar. Prince Marko was a true champion of
right and justice. At that time the Civil War in America
had just come to a close, and the name of Lincoln, when-
ever mentioned by Baba Batikin, suggested an Ajnerican
Prince Marko. The impressions which I carried away
from these neighborhood gatherings were a spiritual food
which nourished in my young mind the sentiment that
the noblest thing in this world is the struggle for right,
justice, and freedom. It was the love of freedom and of
right and justice which made the Serbs of the military
frontier desert their ancestral homes in old Serbia and

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 9

move into Austria, where they gladly consented to live
in subterranean houses and crawl like woodchucks under
the ground as long as they could enjoy the blessings of
political freedom.

The military frontiersmen had their freedom guaran-
teed to them by the Privilegia, and, in exchange for
their freedom, they were always ready to fight for the
Emperor of Austria on any battle-field. Loyalty to the
emperor was the cardinal virtue of the mihtary frontiers-
men. It was that loyalty which overcame their admira-
tion for Garibaldi in 1866; hence the Austrian victory at
Custozza. The Emperor of Austria as a guardian of
their freedom received a place of honor in the selected
class of men like Prince Marko, Karageorge, Czar Alex-
ander the Liberator, Lincoln, and Garibaldi. These were
the names recorded in the Hall of Fame of Idvor. When,
however, the emperor, in 1869, dissolved the military
frontier and delivered its people to the Hungarians, the
military frontiersmen felt that they were betrayed by
the emperor, who had broken his faith to them recorded
in the Privilegia. I remember my father saying to me
one day: ''Thou shalt never be a soldier in the emper-
or's army. The emperor has broken his word; the em-
peror is a traitor in the eyes of the military frontiers-
men. We despise the man who is not true to his word."
This is the reason why the picture of the Emperor of
Austria was not allowed a place in my father's house
after 1869.

As I look back upon those days I feel, as I always felt,
that this treacherous act of the Austrian emperor in 1869
was the beginning of the end of the Austrian Empire.
It was the beginning of nationalism in the reahn of Em-
peror Francis Joseph of Hapsburg. The love of the
people for the country in which they lived began to lan-
guish and finally died. When that love dies, the country

10 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

also must die. This was the lesson which I learned from
the illiterate peasants of Idvor.

My teacher in the village school never succeeded in
making upon my mind that profound impression which
was made upon it by the men at the neighborhood gather-
ings. They were men who had gone out into the world
and taken an active part in the struggles of the world.
Reading, writing, and arithmetic appeared to me like in-
struments of torture which the teacher, who, in my opin-
ion at that time, knew nothing of the world, had invented
in order to interfere as much as possible with my free-
dom, particularly when I had an important engagement
with my chums and playmates. But my mother soon
convinced me that I was wrong. She could neither read
nor write, and she told me that she always felt that she
was blind, in spite of the clear vision of her eyes. So
bhnd, indeed, that, as she expressed it, she did not dare
venture into the world much beyond the confines of my
native village. This was as far as I remember now the
mode of reasoning which she would address to me: ''My
boy, if you wish to go out into the world about which
you hear so much at the neighborhood gatherings, you
must provide yourself with another pair of eyes; the eyes
of reading and writing. There is so much wonderful
knowledge and learning in the world which you cannot
get unless you can read and write. Knowledge is the
golden ladder over which we climb to heaven; knowledge
is the light which illuminates our path through this life
and leads to a future life of everlasting glory." She was
a very pious woman, and had a rare knowledge of both
the Old and the New Testaments. The Psalms were her
favorite recitations. She knew also the lives of saints.
St. Sava was her favorite saint. She was the first to
make me understand the story of the life of this wonder-
ful Serb. This, briefly stated, was the story which she
told me: Sava was the youngest son of the Serb Zhupan

WHAi 1 bKUUGH'l lU AMERICA 11

Nemanya. At an early age he renounced his royal titles
and retired to a monastery on Mount Athos and devoted
many years to study and meditation. He then returned
to his native land, in the beginning of the thirteenth cen-
tury, and became the first Serbian archbishop and
founded an autonomous Serbian church. He also organ-
ized public schools in his father's realm, where Serbian
boys and girls had an opportunity to learn how to read
and write. Thus he opened the eyes of the Serbian peo-
ple, and the people in grateful recognition of these great
services called him St. Sava the Educator, and praised
forever his saintly name and memory. Seven hundred
years had passed since St. Sava's time, but not one of them
had passed without a memorial celebration dedicated to
him in every town and in every home where a Serb lived.
This was a revelation to me. Like every schoolboy, I
attended, of course, every year in January, the celebrations
of St. Sava's day. On these occasions we unruly boys
made fun of the big boy who in a trembling and awkward
voice was reciting something about St. Sava, which the
teacher had written out for him. After this recitation, the
teacher, with a funny nasal twang, would do his best to
supplement in a badly articulated speech what he had
written out for the big boy, and finally the drowsy-looking
priest would wind up with a sermon bristling with archaic
Slavonic church expressions, which to us imruly boys
sounded like awkward attempts of a Slovak mouse- trap
dealer to speak Serbian. Our giggling merriment then
reached a climax, and so my mischievous chums never gave
me a chance to catch the real meaning of the ceremonies
on St. Sava's day. My mother's story of St. Sava and
the way in which she told it made the image of St. Sava
appear before me for the first time in the light of a saint
who glorified the value of books and of the art of writing.
I understood then why mother placed such value upon
reading and writing. I vowed to devote myself to both,
even if that should make it necessary to neglect my

12 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

chums and playmates, and soon I convinced my mother
that in reading and writing I could do at least as well as
any boy. The teacher observed the change; he was as-
tonished, and actually believed that a miracle had oc-
curred. My mother believed in miracles, and told the
teacher that the spirit of St. Sava was guiding me. One
day she told him in my presence that in a dream she saw
St. Sava lay his hands upon my head, and then turning
to her say: ^'Daughter Piada, your boy will soon out-
grow the village school of Idvor. Let him then go out
into the world, where he can find more brain food for his
hungry head.'^ Next year the teacher selected me to
make the recitation on St. Sava's day, and he wrote out
the speech for me. My mother amended and amplified
it and made me rehearse it for her over and over again.
On St. Sava^s day the first public speech of my fife was
delivered by me. The success was overwhelming. My
chums, the unruly boys, did not giggle; on the contrary,
they looked interested, and that encouraged me much.
The people said to each other that even old Baba Batikin
could not have done much better. My mother cried for
joy; my teacher shook his head, and the priest looked
puzzled, and they both admitted that I had outgrown the
village school of Idvor.

At the end of that year my mother prevailed upon my
father to send me to a higher school in the town of Pan-
chevo, on the Tamish River, about fifteen miles south of
Idvor, quite near the point where the Tamish flows into
the Danube. There I found teachers whose learning made
a deep impression upon me, particularly their learning in
natural science, a subject entirely unknown in Idvor.
There I heard for the first time that an American named
Franklin, operating with a kite and a ke^^, had discovered
that lightning was a passage of an electrical spark be-
tween cloudsj and that thunder was due to the sudden

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 13

expansion of the atmosphere heated by the passage of the
electrical spark. The story was illustrated by an actual
frictional electrical machine. This information thrilled
me; it was so novel and so simple, I thought, and so con-
trary to all my previous notions. During my visit home
I eagerly took the first opportunity to describe this new
knowledge to my father and his peasant friends, who were
seated in front of our house and were enjoying their Sun-
day-afternoon talks. I suddenly observed that my father
and his friends looked at each other in utter astonishment.
They seemed to ask each other the question: ^'What
heresy may this be which this impudent brat is disclos-
ing to us?" And then my father, glaring at me, asked
whether I had forgotten that he had told me on so many
occasions that thunder was due to the rumbling of St.
Elijah's car as he drove across the heavens, and whether
I thought that this American Franklin, who played with
kites like an idle boy, knew more than the wisest men of
Idvor. I always had a great respect for my father's
opinions, but on that occasion I could not help smiling
with a smile of ill-concealed irony which angered him.
When I saw the flame of anger in his big black eyes I
jumped and ran for safety. During supper my father,
whose anger had cooled considerably, described to my
mother the heresy which I was preaching on that after-
noon. My mother observed that nowhere in the Holy
Scriptures could he find support of the St. Elijah legend,
and that it was quite possible that the American Franklin
was right and that the St. Elijah legend was wrong. In
matters of correct interpretation of ancient authorities my
father was always ready to abide by the decisions of my
mother, and so father and I became reconciled again.
My mother's admission of the possibility that the Amer-
incan Franklin might, after all, be wiser than all the wise
men of Idvor, and my father's silent consent, aroused in
me a keen interest in America. Lincoln and Franklin

14 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

were two names with which my early ideas of America
were associated.

During those school-days in Panchevo I passed my
summer vacation in my native village. Idvor, just like
the rest of Banat, lives principally from agriculture, and
during harvest-time it is as busy as a beehive. Old and
young, man and beast, concentrate all their efforts upon
the harvest operations. But nobody is busier than the
Serbian ox. He is the most loyal and effective servant of
the Serb peasant everywhere, and particularly in Banat.
He does all the ploughing in the spring, and he hauls the
seasoned grain from the distant fertile fields to the thresh-
ing-grounds in the village when the harvesting season is
on. The commencement of the threshing operations
marks the end of the strenuous efforts of the good old ox ;
his summer vacation begins, and he is sent to pasture-lands
to feed and to rest and to prepare himself for autumn
hauling of the yellow corn and for the autumn ploughing of
the fields. The village boys who are not big enough to
render much help on the threshing-grounds are assigned
to the task of watching over the grazing oxen during their
summer vacation. The school vacation of the boys co-
incided with the vacation of the good old ox. Several sum-
mers I passed in that interesting occupation. These were
my only smnmer schools, and they were the most inter-
esting schools that I ever attended.

The oxen of the village were divided into herds of about
fifty head, and each herd was guarded by a squad of some
twelve boys from families owning the oxen in the herd.
Each squad was under the command of a young man who
was an experienced herdsman. To watch a herd of fifty
oxen was not an easy task. In daytime the job was easy,
because the heat of the summer sun and the torments of
the ever-busy fly made the oxen hug the shade of the trees,
where they rested awaiting the cooler hours of the day.
At night, however, the task was much more difficult. Be-

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 15

ing forced to hug the shade of the trees during daytime,
the oxen would get but Httle enjoyment of the pasture,
and so when the night arrived they were quite hungry and
eagerly searched for the best of feed.

I must mention now that the pasture-lands of my native
village lay alongside of territory of a score of square miles
which in some years were all planted in corn. During the
months of August and September these vast corn-fields
were like deep forests. Not far from Idvor and to the east
of the corn-fields was a Rumanian settlement which was
notorious for its cattle-thieves. The trick of these thieves
was to hide in the corn-fields at night and to wait until
some cattle strayed into these fields, when they would drive
them away and hide them somewhere in their own corn-
fields on the other side of their own village. To prevent
the herd from straying into the corn-fields at night was a
great task, for the performance of which the boys had to
be trained in daytime by their experienced leader. It
goes without saying that each day we boys first worked
off our superfluous energy in wrestling, swimming, hockey,
and other strenuous games, and then settled down to the
training in the arts of a herdsman which we had to prac-
tise at night. One of these arts was signalling through the
ground. Each boy had a knife with a long wooden han-
dle. This knife was stuck deep into the ground. A sound
was made by striking against the wooden handle, and the
boys, lying down and pressing their ears close to the
ground, had to estimate the direction and the distance of
the origin of sound. Practice made us quite expert in
this form of signalling. We knew at that time that the
sound travelled through the ground far better than through
the air, and that a hard and soHd ground transmitted sound
much better than the ploughed-up ground. We knew,
therefore, that the sound produced this way near the edge
of the pasture-land could not be heard in the soft ground

16 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of the corn-fields stretching along the edge. A Rumanian
cattle-thief, hidden at night in the corn-fields, could not
hear our ground signals and could not locate us. Kos, the
Slovenian, my teacher and interpreter of physical phe-
nomena, could not explain this, and I doubt very much
whether the average physicist of Europe at that time
could have explained it. It is the basis of a discovery
which I made about twenty-five years after my novel ex-
periences in that herdsmen's summer school in Idvor.

On perfectly clear and quiescent summer nights on the
plains of my native Banat, the stars are intensely bright
and the sky looks black by contrast. ^^Thy hair is as
black as the sky of a summer midnight'' is a favorite
saying of a Serbian lover to his lady-love. On such nights
we could not see our grazing oxen when they were more
than a few score of feet from us, but we could hear them
if we pressed our ears close to the ground and listened.
On such nights we boys had our work cut out for us. We
were placed along a definite line at distances of some
twenty yards apart. This was the dead-line, which sep-
arated the pasture-lands from the corn-field territory.
The motto of the French at Verdun was: ^'They shall not
pass!" This was our motto, too, and it referred equally
to our friends, the oxen, and to our enemies, the Ruma-
nian cattle-thieves. Our knife-blades were deep in the
ground and our ears were pressed against the handles.
We could hear every step of the roaming oxen and even
their grazing operations when they were sufficiently near
to the dead-line. We knew that these grazing operations
were regulated by the time of the night, and this we es-
timated by the position of certain constellations like Orion
and the Pleiades. The positions of the evening star and
of the morning star also were closely observed. Venus
was our white star and Mars was called the red star. The
Dipper, the north star, and the milky way were our com-

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 17

pass. We knew also that when in the dead of the night
we could hear the faint sound of the church-bell of the
Rumanian settlement about four miles to the east of us,
then there was a breeze from the corn-fields to the pasture-
lands, and that it carried the sweet perfume of the young
corn to the hungry oxen, inviting them to the rich ban-
quet-table of the corn-fields. On such nights our vigilance
was redoubled. We were then all eyes and ears. Our ears
were closely pressed to the ground and our eyes were riv-
eted upon the stars above.

The light of the stars, the sound of the grazing oxen,
and the faint strokes of the distant church-bell were
messages of caution which on those dark summer nights
guided our vigilance over the precious herd. These mes-
sages appealed to us like the loving words of a friendly
power, without whose aid we were helpless. They were
the only signs of the world's existence which dominated
our consciousness as, enveloped in the darkness of night
and surrounded by countless burning stars, we guarded
the safety of our oxen. The rest of the world had gone
out of existence; it began to reappear in our consciousness
when the early dawn announced what we boys felt to be
the divine command, ''Let there be light," and the sun
heralded by long white streamers began to approach the
eastern sky, and the earth gradually appeared as if by an
act of creation. Every one of those mornings of fifty
years ago appeared to us herdsmen to be witnessing the
creation of the world — a world at first of friendly sound
and light messages which made us boys feel that a divine
power was protecting us and our herd, and then a real
terrestrial world, when the rising sun had separated the
hostile mysteries of night from the friendly realities of the
day.

Sound and light became thus associated in my early
modes of thought with the divine method of speech and

18 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

communication, and this belief was strengthened by my
mother, who quoted the words of St. John: ''In the be-
ginning was the word, and the word was with God, and
the word was God."

I beHeved also that David, some of whose Psabns,
under the instruction of my mother, I knew by heart,
and who in his youth was a shepherd, expressed my
thoughts in his nineteenth Psalm:

"The heavens declare the glory of God. . . ."

"There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard."

Then, there is no Serb boy who has not heard that
beautiful Russian song by Lyermontoff, the great Rus-
sian poet, which says:

"Lonely I wander over the country road,
And in the darkness the stony path is glimmering;
Night is silent and the plains are whispering
To God, and star speaketh to star."

Lyermontoff was a son of the Russian plains. He saw
the same burning stars in the blackness of a summer mid-
night sky which I saw. He felt the same thrill which
David felt and through his Psalms transmitted to me
during those watchful nights of fifty years ago. I pity
the city-bred boy who has never felt the mysterious force
of that heavenly thrill.

Sound and light being associated in my young mind
of fifty years ago with divine operations by means of
which man communicates with man, beast with beast,
stars with stars, and man with his Creator, it is obvious
that I meditated much about the nature of sound and
of light. I still believe that these modes of communica-
tion are the fundamental operations in the physical uni-
verse and I am still meditating about their nature. My
teachers in Panchevo rendered some assistance in solving
many of the puzzles which I met in the course of these

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 19

meditations. Kos, my Slovenian teacher, who was the
first to tell me the story of Franklin and his kite, was a
great help. He soon convinced me that sound was a
vibration of bodies. This explanation agreed with the
Serbian figure of speech which says:

"My heart quivers like the melodious string under the guslar's bow."

I also felt the quivering air whenever during my term
of service as guardian of the oxen I tried my skill at the
Serbian flute. Few things excited my interest more than
the operations of the Serbian bagpiper as he forced the air
from his sheepskin bellows and made it sing by regulating
its passage through the pipes. The operations which
the bagpiper called adjustment and tuning of the bag-
pipes commanded my closest attention. I never dreamed
then that a score of years later I should do a similar opera-
tion with an electrical circuit. I called it ^'electrical tun-
ing," a term which has been generally adopted in wireless
telegraphy. But nobody knows that the operation as
well as the name were first suggested to me by the Ser-
bian bagpiper, some twenty years before I made the in-
vention in 1892.

Skipping over several sections of my story, I will say
now that twenty years after my invention of electrical
tuning a pupil of mine, Major Armstrong, discovered the
electrical vacuum-tube oscillator, which promises to revo-
lutionize wireless telegraphy and telephony. A similar
invention, but a little earlier, was made by another pupil
of mine, Mr. Vreeland. Both these inventions in their
mode of operation remind me much of the operation of
Serbian bagpipes. Perhaps some of those thrills which
the Serbian bagpiper stirred up in me in my early youth
were transferred to my pupils, Armstrong and Vreeland.

I was less successful in solving my puzzles concerning
the nature of light. Kos, the Slovenian, my first guide

20 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

and teacher in the study of physical phenomena, told me
the story that a wise man of Greece with the name of
Aristotle beheved that light originates in the eye, which
throws out feelers to the surrounding objects, and that
through these feelers we see the objects, just as we feel
them by our sense of touch. This view did not agree
with the popular saying often heard in Idvor: ^^Pick
your grapes before sunrise, before the thirsty sunbeams
have drunk up their cooHng dew.'^ Nor did it agree with
Bishop Nyegosh, the greatest of Serbian poets, who says:

"The bright-eyed dewdrops glide along the sunbeams to the heavens
above."

The verse from Nyegosh I obtained from a Serbian poet,
who was an arch-priest, a protoyeray, and who was my
religious teacher in Panchevo. His name, Vasa Zhivkovich,
I shall never forget, because it is sweet music to my ears
on account of the memories of affectionate friendship he
cherished for me.

According to this popular belief a beam of hght has
an individual existence just like that of the melodious
string under the guslar's bow. But neither the poet, nor
the wise men of Idvor, nor Kos the Slovenian, ever
mentioned that a beam of light ever quivered, and if it
does not quiver like a vibrating body how can the sun,
the moon, and the stars proclaim the glory of God, and
how can, according to David, their voice be heard wher-
ever there are speech and language? These questions
Kos would not answer. No wonder! Nobody to-day
can give a completely satisfactory answer to questions
relating to radiation of light. Kos was non-committal
and did not seem to attach much importance to the au-
thorities which I quoted; namely, the Serbian poet Nye-
gosh, the wise sayings of Idvor, and the Psalms of David.
Nevertheless, he was greatly interested in my childlike
inquiries and always encouraged me to go on with my

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 21

puzzling questions. Once he invited me to his house,
and there I found that several of his colleagues were pres-
ent. One of them was my friend the poet-priest, and
another was a Hungarian Lutheran preacher who spoke
Serbian well and was famous in Panchevo because of
his great eloquence. They both engaged me in conversa-
tion and showed a lively interest in my summer vacation
experiences as herdsman's assistant. The puzzling ques-
tions about light which I addressed to Kos, and the fact
that Kos would not answer, amused them. My knowl-
edge of the Bible and of the Psalms impressed them much,
and they asked me quite a number of questions concern-
ing my mother. Then they suggested that I might be
transferred from the school in Panchevo to the famous
schools of Prague in Bohemia, if my father and mother
did not object to my going so far away from home. When
I suggested that my parents could not afford to support
me in a great place like Prague, they assured me that
this difficulty might be fixed up. I promised to consult
my parents during the approaching Christmas vacation.
I did, but found my father irresistibly opposed to it.
Fate, however, decreed otherwise.

The history of Banat records a great event for the early
spring of 1872, the spring succeeding the Christmas when
my father and mother agreed to disagree upon the propo-
sition that I go to Prague. Svetozar Miletich, the great
nationalist leader of the Serbs in Austria-Hungary, visited
Panchevo, and the people prepared a torchlight procession
for him. This procession was to be a protest of Panchevo
and of the whole of Banat against the emperor's treach-
ery of 1869. My father had protested long before by
excluding the emperor's picture from our house. That
visit of Miletich marks the beginning of a new political
era in Banat, the era of nationalism. The schoolboys of
Panchevo turned out in great numbers, and I was one
of them, proud to become one of the torch-bearers. We

22 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

shouted ourselves hoarse whenever Miletich in his fiery
speech denounced the emperor for his ingratitude to the
mihtary frontiersmen as well as to all the Serbs of Voy-
vodina. Remembering my father's words on the occasion
mentioned above, I did not hesitate to shout in the name
of the schoolboys present in the procession: ^^ We'll never
serve in Francis Joseph's army!" My chums responded
with: '^Long five the Prince of Serbia ! " The Hungarian
officials took careful notes of the whole proceeding, and
a few days later I was informed that Panchevo was not
a proper place for an ill-mannered peasant boy like me,
and that I should pack up and return to Idvor. Kos,
the Slovenian, and protoyeray Zhivkovich interfered, and
I was permitted to stay.

On the first of May, following, our school celebrated
the May-day festival. The Serb youngsters in the school,
who worshipped Miletich and his nationahsm, prepared
a Serbian flag for the festival march. The other boys,
mostly Germans, Rumanians, and Hungarians, carried
the Austrian yellow-black standard. The nationalist
group among the youngsters stormed the bearer of the
yellow-black standard, and I was caught in the scrim-
mage with the Austrian flag under my feet. Expulsion
from school stared me in the face. Again protoyeray
Zivkovich came to my defense and, thanks to his high
official position and to my high standing in school, I was
allowed to continue with my class until the end of the
school year, after promising that I would not associate
with revolutionary boys who showed an inchnation to
storm the Austrian flag. The matter did not end there,
however. In response to an invitation from the pro-
toyeray, father and mother came to Panchevo to a con-
ference, which resulted in a triumph for my mother. It
was decided that I bid good-by to Panchevo, a hotbed
of nationalism, and go to Prague. The protoyeray and his

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 23

congregation promised assistance if the financial burden
attached to my schooling in Prague should prove too
heavy for my parents.

When the day for the departure for Prague arrived,
my mother had everything ready for my long journey, a
journey of nearly two days on a Danube steamboat to
Budapest, and one day by rail from Budapest to Prague.
Two multicolored bags made of a beautifully colored
web of wool contained my belongings: one my linen, the
other my provisions, consisting of a whole roast goose
and a big loaf of white bread. The only suit of clothes
which I had I wore on my back, and my sisters told me
that it was very styhsh and made me look like a city-
bred boy. To tone down somewhat this misleading ap-
pearance and to provide a warm covering during my
journey for the cold autumn evenings and nights, I wore
a long yellow overcoat of sheepskin trimmed with black
wool and embroidered along the border with black and
red arabesque figures. A black sheepskin cap gave the
finishing touch and marked me as a real son of Idvor.
When I said good-by to father and mother on the steam-
boat landing I expected, of course, that my mother would
cry, and she did; but to my great surprise I noticed two
big tears roll down my father's cheeks. He was a stern
and unemotional person, a splendid type of the heroic
age, and when for the first time in my life I saw a tear in
his luminous eyes I broke down and sobbed, and felt
embarrassed when I saw that the steamboat passengers
were taking a sympathetic interest in my parting from
father and mother. A group of big boys on the boat took
me up and offered to help me to orient myself on the boat;
they were theological students returning to the famous
seminary at Karlovci, the seat of the Serb Patriarch. I
confided to them that I was going to the schools of Prague,
that I never had gone from home farther than Panchevo,
that I had never seen a big steamboat or a railroad- train,

24 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

and that my journey gave me some anxiety because I
could not speak Hungarian and had some difficulty in
handhng the limited German vocabulary which I learned
in Panchevo. Presently we saw a great church-tower in
the distance, and they told me that it was the cathedral
of Karlovci, and that near the cathedral was the palace
of his holiness, the Patriarch. It was at this place that
the Turks begged for peace in 1699, having been defeated
with the aid of the military frontiersmen. Beyond Kar-
lovci, they pointed out, was the mountain of Frushka
Gora, famous in Serbian poetry. This was the first
time I saw a mountain at close range. One historical
scene crowded upon another, and I had some difficulty
to take them all in even with the friendly assistance
of my theological acquaintances. When Karlovci was
reached and my theological friends left the boat, I felt
quite lonesome. I returned to my multicolored bags,
and as I looked upon them and remembered that mother
had made them I felt that a part, at least, of my honey-
hearted home was so near me, and that consoled me.

I noticed that lunch was being served to people who
had ordered it, and I thought of the roast goose which
mother had packed away in my multicolored bag. I
reached for the bag, but, alas! the goose was gone. A
fellow passenger, who sat near me, assured me that he
saw one of the young theologians carry the goose away
while the other theologians engaged me in conversation,
and not knowing to whom the bags belonged, he thought
nothing of the incident. Besides, how could any one
suspect a student of theology? '^Shades of St. Sava,"
said I, '^what kind of orthodoxy will these future apostles
of your faith preach to the Serbs of Banat?'' ^^Ah, my
boy," said an elderly lady who heard my exclamation,
'^do not curse them; they did it just out of innocent mis-
chief. This experience will be worth many a roast goose

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 25

to you; it will teach you that in a world of strangers you
must always keep one eye on w^hat you have and with
the other eye look out for things that you do not have."
She was a most s>Tnpathetic peasant woman, who proba-
bly had seen my dramatic parting with father and mother
on the steamboat landing. I took her advice, and during
the rest of my journey I never lost sight of my multi-
colored bags and of my yellow sheepskin coat.

The sight of Budapest, as the boat approached it on
the following day, nearly took my breath away. At the
neighborhood gatherings in Idvor I had heard many a
story about the splendor of the emperor's palace on the
top of the mountain at Buda, and about the wonders of
a bridge suspended in air across the Danube and con-
necting Buda with Pest. Many legends were told in
Idvor concerning these wonderful things. But what I
saw with my own eyes from the deck of that steamboat
surpassed all my expectations. I was overawed, and for
a moment I should have been glad to turn back and re-
trace my journey to Idvor. The world outside of Idvor
seemed too big and too complicated for me. But as soon
as I landed my courage returned. With the yellow sheep-
skin coat on my back, the black sheepskin cap on my
head, and the multicolored bags firmly grasped in my
hands, I started out to find the railroad-station. A husky
Serb passed by and, attracted by my sheepskin coat and
cap and the multicolored bags, suddenly stopped and
addressed me in Serbian. He lived in Budapest, he said,
and his glad eye and hand assured me that a sincere friend
was speaking to me. He helped me with the bags and
stayed with me until he deposited me in the train that
was to take me to Prague. He cautioned me that at about
four o'clock in the morning my train would reach Gaen-
serndorf (Goosetown), and that there I should get out
and get another train which would take me to Prague.

26 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

The name of this town brought back to memory my goose
which had disappeared at Karlovci, and gloomy fore-
bodings disturbed my mind and made me a Uttle anxious.

This was the first railroad-train that I had ever seen.
It disappointed me; the legendary speed of trains about
which I had heard so much in Idvor was not there. When
the whistle blew and the conductor shouted '^Fertig!''
(Ready!), I shut my eyes and waited anxiously, expect-
ing to be shot forward at a tremendous speed. But the
train started leisurely and, to my great disappointment,
never reached the speeds which I expected. It was a
cold October night; the third-class compartment had only
one other passenger, a fat Hungarian whom I could not
understand, although he tried his best to engage me in
a conversation. My sheepskin coat and cap made me
feel warm and comfortable; I fell asleep, and never woke
up until the rough conductor pulled me off my seat and
ordered me out.

"Vienna, last stop,^' he shouted.

"But I was going to Prague,'' I said.

"Then you should have changed at Gaenserndorf, you
idiot!" answered the conductor, with the usual poUteness
of Austrian officials when they see a Serb before them.
"But why didn't you wake me up at Gaenserndorf?" I
protested. He flared up and made a gesture as if about
to box my ears, but suddenly he changed his mind and
substituted a verbal thrust at my pride. "You little fool
of a Serbian swineherd, do you expect an imperial official
to assist you in your lazy habits vou sleepy mutton-
head?"

"Excuse me," I said with an air of wounded pride, "I
am not a Serbian swineherd; I am a son of a brave mili-
tary frontiersman, and I am going to the famous schools
of Prague."

He softened, and told me that I should have to go back

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 27

to Gaenserndorf after paying my fare to that place and
back. When I informed him that I had no money for
extra travelling expenses, he beckoned to me to come
along, and after a while we stood in the presence of what
I thought to be a very great official. He had a lot of gold
braid on his collar and sleeves and on his cap, and he
looked as stern and as serious as if the cares of the whole
empire rested upon his shoulders.

''Take off your cap, you ill-mannered peasant! Don't
you know how to behave in the presence of your supe-
riors?'' he blurted out, addressing me. I dropped my
multicolored bags, took off my yellow sheepskin coat in
order to cover the bags, and then took off my black sheep-
skin cap, and saluted him in the regular fashion of a mili-
tary frontiersman. I thought that he might be the em-
peror himself and, if so, I wondered if he had ever heard
of my trampling upon his yellow-black flag at that May-
day festival in Panchevo. Finally, I screwed up my cour-
age and apologized by saying:

''Your gracious Majesty will pardon my apparent lack
of respect to my superiors, but this is to me a world of
strangers, and the anxiety about my belongings kept my
hands busy with the bags and prevented me from tak-
ing off my cap when I approached your serene Highness."
I noticed that several persons within hearing distance
were somewhat amused by this interview, and particularly
an elderly looking couple, a lady and a gentleman:

"Why should you feel anxious about your bags?" said
the great official. "You are not in the savage Balkans,
the home of thieves; you are in Vienna, the residence of
his Majesty, the Emperor of Austria-Hungary."

"Yes," said I, "but two days ago my roast goose was
stolen from one of these bags within his Majesty's realm,
and my father told me that all the rights and privileges
of the Voyvodina and of the military frontier were stolen
right here in this very Vienna."

28 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

''Ah, you little rebel, do you expect that this sort of
talk will get you a free transportation from Gaenserndorf
to Vienna and back again? Restrain your rebellious
tongue or I will give you a free transportation back to
your military frontier, where rebels hke you ought to be
behind lock and key."

At this juncture the elderly looking couple engaged
him in conversation, and after a while the gold-braided
mogul informed me that my ticket from Vienna to Prague
by the short route was paid for, and that I should pro-
ceed. The rude conductor, who had called me a Serbian
swineherd a httle while before, led me to the train and
ushered me politely into a first-class compartment. Pres-
ently the elderly looking couple entered and greeted me
in a most friendly, almost affectionate, manner. They
encouraged me to take off my sheepskin coat and make
myself comfortable, and assured me that my bags would
be perfectly safe.

Their German speech had a strange accent, and their
manner and appearance were entirely different from any-
thing that I had ever seen before. But they inspired
confidence. Feehng hungry, I took my loaf of snowy-
white bread out of my bag, and with my herdsman^s
knife with a long wooden handle I cut off two shces and
offered them to my new friends. ''Please, take it," said
I; ''it was prepared by my mother's hands for my long
journey." They accepted my hospitahty and ate the
bread and pronounced it excellent, the best bread they
had ever tasted. I told them how it was made by mixing
leaf-lard and milk with the finest wheat flour, and when
I informed them that I knew a great deal about cooking
and that I had learned it by w^atching my mother, the lady
appeared greatly pleased. The gentleman, her husband,
asked me questions about farming and taking care of
animals, which I answered readily, quoting my father as

VVHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 29

my authority. ^'You had two splendid teachers, your
father and your mother/' they said; ^'do you expect to
find better teachers in Prague?'' I told them briefly
what had sent me to Prague, mentioning particularly that
some people thought that I had outgrown the schools
not only of my native village but also of Panchevo, but
that in reality the main reason was because the Hun-
garian officials did not want me in Panchevo on account
of my showing a strong inclination to develop into a re-
bellious nationaUst. My new friends gave each other a
significant look and said something in a language which
I did not understand. They told me that it was English,
and added that they were from America.

^^ America!" said I, quivering with emotion. ^^Then
you must know a lot about Benjamin Franklin and his
kite, and about Lincoln, the American Prince Marko."

This exclamation of mine surprised them greatly and
furnished the topic for a lively conversation of several
hours, until the train had reached Prague. It was con-
ducted in broken German, but we understood each other
perfectly. I told them of my experience with Franklin's
theory of Hghtning, and of its clash with my father's St.
Ehjah legend, and answered many of their questions re-
lating to my calling Lincoln an American Prince Marko.
I quoted from several Serbian ballads relating to Prince
Marko which I had learned from Baba Batikin, and at
their urgent request described with much detail the neigh-
borhood gatherings in Idvor. They returned the com-
plunent by telling me stories of Benjamin Franklin, of
Lincoln, and of America, and urged me to read '^ Uncle
Tom's Cabin," a translation of which I discovered
some time afterward. When the train reached Prague
they insisted that I be their guest at their Prague hotel,
called the Blue Star, for a day, at least, until I found my
friends in Prague. I gladly accepted, and spent a de-
Hghtful evening with them. The sweetness of their dis-

30 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

position was an unfathomable riddle to me. The riddle,
however, was solved several years later.

I mentioned above that the first sight of Budapest nearly
took my breath away. The first view of Prague filled
me with a strange religious fervor. The ancient gates,
surmounted by towers with wonderful stone carvings
and inscriptions; the lofty domes, crowning mediaeval
cathedrals, the portals of which were bristhng with beau-
tiful images of saints; the historic public buildings, each
of which told a story of the old glories of Bohemia's king-
dom; the ancient stone bridge across the Moldava River,
supporting statues of Christian martyrs; the royal palace
on the hill of Hradchin, which seemed to rise way up
above the clouds — all these, and many other wonderful
things, made me feel that it was places hke Prague which
St. Sava visited when he deserted his royal parents and
went to the end of the world to seek new knowledge. I
saw then why the protoyeray of Panchevo had suggested
that I go to Prague; I even began to suspect that he ex-
pected the influence of Prague to turn my attention to
theology. I think now that it would have done so if it
had not been for that unpleasant goose incident at Kar-
lovci. Besides, there was another influence at Prague,
which was more powerful than any other influence in the
Austrian Empire at that time.

The sights of Prague interested me more than its
famous schools, which I was to enter and delayed enter-
ing. But finally I was enrolled, and the boys in the school
scrutinized me with a puzzled expression, as if they could
not make out what country or clime I came from. When
they found out that I hailed from the Serb military fron-
tier, all uncertainty vanished, and I knew exactly where
I stood. The German boys became very cold, the Czech
boys greeted me in their own tongue and hugged m^

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 31

when by my Serbian answer I proved not only that 1
understood them but also that I expected them to under-
stand my Serbian greeting. They were all nationalists
to the core and did their best to make me join tlieir ranks,
which, after some reluctance, I finally did. I showed
them then two letters from protoyeray Zhivkovich in-
troducing me to Rieger and to Palacky, the great apostles
of Panslavism and of nationaHsm in Bohemia. From
that day on I was one of their young revolutionary set,
and henceforth school lessons looked tame and lost most
of their charm to me.

The German victory in France two years prior to that
time, resulting as it did in the creation of a united Ger-
many, had encouraged Teutonism to run riot wherever
it met a current opposing it, as it did in Prague. Na-
tionalism in Bohemia was a reaction against Austrian
Teutonism in those days, just as it was a reaction against
Magyarism in Voyvodina and in the military frontier.
Hardly a day passed without serious clashes between the
Czech nationalist boys and their German classmates.
That which made my stay in Panchevo impossible met
me in Prague in an even more violent form. Loyal to
the traditions of the Serbian military frontiersmen, I
liked nothing better than a good fight, and I had the
physique and the practice, gained in the pasturelands of
Idvor, to hck any German boy of my age or even older.
The German pupils feared me, and the German teachers
condenmed what they called my revolutionary tenden-
cies, and threatened to send me back to Idvor. As time
went on, I began to wish that they would expel me and
give me a good excuse to return to Idvor. I missed the
wide horizon of the plains of Banat in the narrow streets
of Prague. My httle bedroom in a garret, the only living
quarters that I could afford, was a sad contrast to my
mode of life on the endless plains of Banat, where for

32 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

six weeks each summer I had hved under the wide canopy
of heaven, watching the grazing oxen, gazing upon the
countless stars at night, and hstening to the sweet strains
of the Serbian flute. The people I met on the streets
were puffed up with Teutonic pride or with official ar-
rogance; they had none of the gentle manliness and friend-
liness of the mihtary frontiersmen. The teachers looked
to me more like Austrian gendarmes than like sympa-
thetic friends. They cared more for my sentiments to-
ward the emperor and for my ideas about nationahsm
than for my ideas relating to God and his beautiful world
of life and light. Not one of them reminded me of Kos,
the Slovenian, or of protoyeray Zhivkovich in Panchevo.
Race antagonism was at that time the ruling passion.
If it had not been for the affectionate regard which the
Czech boys and their parents had for me I should have
felt most lonesome; from Banat to Prague was too sud-
den a change for me.

Another circumstance I must mention now which
helped to brace me up. I delivered, after many months
of delay, my letters of introduction to Rieger and to Pa-
lacky. I saw their pictures, I read about them, and finally
I heard them address huge nationalist meetings. They
were great men, I thought, and I could not screw up suf-
ficient courage to call on them, as the protoyeray wished
me to do, and waste their precious time on my account.
But when I received a letter from the protoyeray in Pan-
chevo asking why I had not delivered the letters of in-
troduction he had given me, I made the calls. Rieger
looked like my father: dark, stern, reserved, powerful
of physique, with a wonderful luminosity in his eyes.
He gave me coffee and cake, consuming a generous sup-
ply of them himself. When I kissed his hand, bidding
him good-by, he gave me a florin for pocket-money, patted
me on the cheek, and assured me that I could easily come

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 33

up to the protoyeray's expectations and surprise my teach-
ers if I would only spend more time on my books and less
on my nationalist chums. This suggestion and indirect
advice made me very thoughtful. Palacky was a gentle,
smooth-faced, old gentleman, who looked to me then as
if he knew everything that men had ever known, and
that much study had made him pale and delicate. He
was much interested in my description of the life and
customs of my native village, and when I mentioned
St. Sava, he drew a parallel between this saint and Yan
Huss, the great Czech patriot and divine, who was burned
at the stake in 1415 at Constance because he demanded
a national democratic church in Bohemia. He gave me a
book in which I could read all about Huss and the Huss-
ite wars and about the one-eyed Zhizhka, the great Huss-
ite general. He gave me no coffee nor cake, probably be-
cause his health did not permit him to indulge in eatables
between meals, but assured me of assistance if I should
ever need it. I eagerly read the book about Yan Huss
and the Hussite w^ars, and became a mxore enthusiastic
nationalist than ever before. I felt that Rieger's influence
pulled me in one direction, and that Palacky encouraged
me to persist in the opposite direction w^hich I had selected
under the influence of the spirit of Czech nationalism.

In my letters to my elder sisters, which they read to
father and mother, I described with much detail the beau-
ties and wonders of Prague, my receptions and talks
with Rieger and Palacky, and elaborated much the parallel
between St. Sava and Yan Huss to which Palacky had
drawn my attention, and which I expected would please
my mother; but I never mentioned Rieger's advice that
I stick to books and leave the nationalist propaganda of
the boys alone. I never during my whole year's stay in
Prague sent a report home on my school work, because I
never did more than just enough to prevent my dropping

34 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

to the lower grade. My mother and the protoyeray in
Panchevo expected immeasurably more. Hence, I never
complained about the smallness of the allowance which
my parents could give me, and, therefore, they did not
appeal to my Panchevo friends for the additional help
which they had promised. I felt that I had no right to
make such an appeal, because I did not devote myself
entirely to the work for which I was sent to Prague.

While debating with myself whether to follow Rieger's
advice and leave nationaUsm in the hands of more ex-
perienced people and devote myself to my lessons only,
an event occurred which was the turning-point in my life.
I received a letter from my sister informing me that my
father had died suddenly after a very brief illness. She
told me also that my father had had a premonition that
he would die soon and never see me again when, a year
before, he bade me good-by on the steamboat landing.
I understood then the meaning of the tears which on that
day of parting I had seen roll down his cheeks for the
first time in my Hfe. I immediately informed my mother
that I wanted to return to Idvor and help her take care
of my fa therms land. But she would not hsten, and in-
sisted that I stay in Prague, where I was seeing and learn-
ing so many wonderful things. I knew quite well what
a heavy burden my schooling would be to her, and my
school record did not entitle me to expect the protoyeray
to make his promise of assistance good. I decided to
find a way of reUeving my mother of any further burdens
so far as I was concerned.

One day I saw on the last page of an illustrated paper
an advertisement of the Hamburg- American fine, offering
steerage transportation from Hamburg to New York for
twenty-eight florins. I thought of my mellow-hearted
American friends of the year before who bought a first-

VvTIAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 35

class railroad-ticket for me from Vienna to Prague, and
decided on the spot to try my fortune in the land of
Franklin and Lincoln as soon as I could save up and other-
wise scrape up money enough to carry me from Prague
to New York. My books, my watch, my clothes, includ-
ing the yellow sheepskin coat and the black sheepskin
cap, were all sold to make up the sum necessary for travel-
Hng expenses. I started out with just one suit of clothes
on my back and a few changes of linen, and a red Turkish
fez which nobody would buy. And why should anybody
going to New York bother about warm clothes? Was
not New York much farther south than Panchevo, and
does not America suggest a hot cHmate when one thinks
of the pictures of naked Indians so often seen? These
thoughts consoled me when I parted with my sheep-
skin coat. At length I came to Hamburg, ready to
embark but with no money to buy a mattress and a
blanket for my bunk in the steerage. Several days later
my ship, the Westphalia, sailed — on the twelfth day of
March, 1874. My mother received several days later
my letter, mailed in Hamburg, telling her in most affec-
tionate terms that, in my opinion, I had outgrown the
school, the teachers, and the educational methods of
Prague, and was about to depart for the land of FrankUn
and Lincoln, where the wisdom of people was beyond
anything that even St. Sava had ever known. I assured
her that with her blessing and God's help I should cer-
tainly succeed, and promised that I would soon return
rich in rare knowledge and in honors. The letter was
dictated by the rosiest optimism that I could invent.
Several months later I found to my great dehght that
my mother had accepted cheerfully this rosy view of my
unexpected enterprise.

The ship sailed with a full complement of steerage
passengers, mostly Germans. As we glided along the

36 FROM IMINIIGRANT TO INVENTOR

River Elbe the emigrants were all on deck, watching the
land as it gradually vanished from our sight. Presently
the famous German emigrant song rang through the air,
and with a heavy heart I took in the*words of its refrain:

"Oh, how hard it would be to leave the homeland shores
If the hope did not live that soon we shall see them again.
Farewell, farev/ell, until we see you again."

I did not wait for the completion of the song, but turned
in, and in my bare bunk I sought to drown my sadness
in a flood of tears. Idvor, with its sunny fields, vine-
yards, and orchards; with its grazing herds of cattle and
flocks of sheep; with its beautiful church-spire and the
solenm ringing of church-bells; with its merry boys and
girls dancing to the tune of the Serbian bagpipes the Kolo
on the village green — Idvor, with all the famihar scenes
that I had ever seen there, appeared before my tearful
eyes, and in the midst of them I saw my mother listening
to my sister reading slowly the letter which I had sent
to her from Hamburg. Every one of these scenes seemed
to start a new shower of tears, which finally cleared the
oppressiveness of my spiritual atmosphere. I thought
that I could hear my mother say to my sister: ^^God
bless him for his affectionate letter. May the spirit of
St. Sava guide him in the land beyond the seas ! I know
that he will make good his promises." Sadness deserted
me then and I felt strong again.

He who has never crossed the stormy Atlantic during
the month of March in the crowded steerage of an im-
migrant ship does not know what hardships are. I bless
the stars that the immigration laws were different then
than they are now, otherwise I should not be among the
Uving. To stand the great hardships of a stormy sea
when the rosy picture of the promised land is before your
mind's eye is a severe test for any boj^'s nerve and physical
stamina; but to face the same hardships as a deported and

TVTIAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 37

penniless immigrant with no cheering prospect in sight
is too much for any person, unless that person is entirely
devoid of every finer sensibility. Many a night I spent
on the deck of that immigrant ship hugging the warm
smoke-stack and adjusting my position so as to avoid
the force of the gale and the sharpness of its icy chilliness.
All I had was the light suit of clothes which I carried on
my back. Everything else I had converted into money
with which to cover my transportation expenses. There
was nothing left to pay for a blanket and mattress for
my steerage bunk. I could not rest there during the cold
nights of March without much shivering and unbearable
discomfort. If it had not been for the warm smoke-stack
I should have died of cold. At first I had to fight for my
place there in the daytime, but when the immigrants
understood that I had no warm clothing they did not
disturb me any longer. I often thought of my yellow
sheepskin coat and the black sheepskin cap, and under-
stood more clearly than ever my mother's far-sightedness
when she provided that coat and cap for my long journeys.
A blast of the everlasting gales had carried away my hat,
and a Turkish fez such as the Serbs of Bosnia wear was
the only head-gear I had. It was providential that I
had not succeeded in selling it in Prague. Most of my
fellow emigrants thought that I was a Turk and cared
httle about my discomforts. But, nevertheless, I felt
quite brave and strong in the daytime; at night, how-
ever, when, standing alone alongside of the smoke-stack, I
beheld through the howling darkness the white rims of
the mountain-high waves speeding on like maddened
dragons toward the tumbling ship, my heart sank low.
It was my impHcit trust in God and in his regard for my
mother's prayers which enabled me to overcome my fear
and bravely face the horrors of the angry seas.

On the fourteenth day, early in the morning, the flat
coast-fine of Long Island hove in sight. Nobody in the

38 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

motley crowd of excited immigrants was more happy to
see the promised land than I was. It was a clear, mild,
and sunny March morning, and as we approached New
York Harbor the warm sun-rays seemed to thaw out the
chilliness which I had accumulated in my body by con-
tinuous exposure to the wintry blasts of the North At-
lantic. I felt Uke a new person, and saw in every new
scene presented by the New World as the ship moved
into it a new promise that I should be welcome. Life
and activity kept blossoming out all along the ship's
course, and seemed to reach full bloom as we entered
New York Harbor. The scene which was then unfolded
before my eyes was most novel and bewildering. The
first impressions of Budapest and of Prague seemed like
pale-faced images of the grand reaUties which New York
Harbor disclosed before my eager eyes. A countless
multitude of boats lined each shore of the vast river; all
kinds of craft ploughed hurriedly in every direction
through the waters of the bay; great masses of people
crowded the numerous ferry-boats, and gave me the im-
pression that one crowd was just about as anxious to
reach one shore of the huge metropolis as the other was
to reach the other shore; they all must have had some
important thing to do, I thought. The city on each side
of the shore seemed to throb with activity. I did not
distinguish between New York and Jersey City. Hun-
dreds of other spots like the one I beheld, I thought, must
be scattered over the vast territories of the United States,
and in these seething pots of human action there must
be some one activity, I was certain, which needed me.
This gave me courage. The talk which I had listened
to during two weeks on the immigrant ship was rather
discouraging, I thought. One immigrant was bragging
about his long experience as a cabinetmaker, and informed
his audience that cabinetmakers were in great demand
in America; another one was telUng long tales about his

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 39

skill as a mechanician; a third one was spinning out long
yarns about the fabulous agricultural successes of his
relatives out West, who had invited him to come there
and join them; a fourth confided to the gaping crowd
that his brother, who was anxiously waiting for him,
had a most prosperous bank in some rich mining-camp
in Nevada where people never saw any money except
silver and gold and hardly ever a coin smaller than a
dollar; a fifth one, who had been in America before, told
us in a rather top-lofty way that no matter who you were
or what you knew or what you had you would be a green-
horn when you landed in the New World, and a green-
horn has to serve his apprenticeship before he can estab-
lish his claim to any recognition. He admitted, however,
that immigrants with a previous practical training, or
strong pull through relatives and friends, had a shorter
apprenticeship. I had no practical training, and I had
no relatives nor friends nor even acquaintances in the
New World. I had nothing of any immediate value to
offer to the land I was about to enter. That thought
had discouraged me as I Hstened to the talks of the im-
migrants; but the activity which New York Harbor pre-
sented to my eager eyes on that sunny March day was
most encom-aging.

Presently the ship passed by Castle Garden, and I
heard some one say: ^' There is the Gate to America.'^
An hour or so later we all stood at the gate. The im-
migrant ship, Westphalia, landed at Hoboken and a tug
took us to Castle Garden. We were carefully examined
and cross-examined, and when my turn came the ex-
amining officials shook their heads and seemed to find
me wanting. I confessed that I had only five cents in
my pocket and had no relatives here, and that I knew
of nobody in this country except Franklin, Lincoln, and
Harriet Beecher Stowe, whose '^Uncle Tom's Cabin" I
had read in a translation. One of the officials, who had

40 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

one leg only, and walked with a crutch, seemed much
unpressed by this remark, and looking very kindly into
my eyes and with a merry twinkle in his eye he said
in German: '^You showed good taste when you picked
your American acquaintances. '^ I learned later that he
was a Swiss who had served in the Union army during
the Civil War. I confessed also to the examining officials
that I had no training in the arts and crafts, but that I
was anxious to learn, and that this desire had brought
me to America. In answer to the question why I had
not stayed at home or in Prague to learn instead of wan-
dering across the sea with so little on my back and noth-
ing in my pocket, I said that the Hungarian and Austrian
authorities had formed a strong prejudice against me on
account of my sympathies with people, and particularly
with my father, who objected to being cheated out of
their ancient rights and privileges which the emperor
had guaranteed to them for services which they had been
rendering to him loyally for nearly two hundred years.
I spoke with feeling, and I felt that I made an impression
upon the examiners, who did not look to me Hke officials
such as I was accustomed to see in Austria-Hungary.
They had no gold and silver braid and no superior airs
but looked very much like ordinary civihan mortals.
That gave me courage and confidence, and I spoke frankly
and fearlessly, beheving firmly that I was addressing
human beings who had a heart which w^as not held in
bondage by cast-iron rules invented by their superiors
in authority. The Swiss veteran who walked on crutches,
having lost one of his legs in the Civil War, was partic-
ularly attentive while I was being cross-examined, and
nodded approvingly whenever I scored a point with my
answers. He whispered something to the other officials,
and they finally informed me that I could pass on, and I
was conducted promptly to the Labor Bureau of Castle
Garden. My Swiss friend looked me up a httle later and

WHAT I BROUGHT TO AMERICA 41

informed me that the examiners had made an exception
in my favor and admitted me, and that I must look sharp
and find a job as soon as possible.

As I sat in the Labor Bureau waiting for somebody
to come along and pick me out as a worthy candidate
for some job, I could not help surveying those of my fel-
low immigrants who, like myself, sat there waiting for a
job. I really believed that they were in a class below
me, and yet they had had no trouble in being admitted.
They had not needed favors on the part of the officials
in order to be admitted. I had, and therefore, I inferred,
they must have appeared to the officials to be more de-
sirable. It was true, I said, arguing with myself, that
they had a definite trade; they undoubtedly had some
money; and they certainly looked more prosperous than
I did, judging by their clothes. But why should the pos-
session of a trade, of money, or of clothes stand so much
higher in Ajnerica than it did in Idvor, my native village ?
We had a blacksmith, a wheelwright, and a barber in
Idvor; they were our craftsmen; and we had a Greek
storekeeper who had a lot of money and wore expensive
city-made clothes, but there was not one respectable
Serb peasant in Idvor, no matter how poor, who did not
think that he was superior to these people who had only
a transient existence in our historic village. The knowl-
edge of our traditions and our impHcit behef in them made
us feel superior to people who wandered about like gypsies
with no traditions, and with nothing to anchor them to
a definite place. A newcomer to our village was closely
scrutinized, and he was judged not so much by his skill
in a craft, nor by his money, nor by his clothes, but by
his personahty, by the reputation of his family, and by
the traditions of the people to whom he belonged. The
examiners at Castle Garden seemed to attach no im-
portance to these things, because they did not ask me a

42 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

single question concerning my family, the history of my
village, or the history of the mihtary frontier and of the
Serb race. It was no wonder, said I, consoling myself,
that I appeared to them less desirable than many of the
other immigrants who would never have been allowed to
settle in Idvor, and whose society on the immigrant ship
had interested me so httle, and, in fact, had often been
repulsive to me, because I could not help considering
many of them a sort of spiritual muckers. My admission
by a special favor of the examiners was a puzzle and a
disappointment to me, but it did not destroy the firmness
of my beUef that I brought to America something which
the examiners were either unable or did not care to find
out, but which, nevertheless, I valued very highly, and
that was: a knowledge of and a profound respect and
admiration for the best traditions of my race. My mother
and the ilUterate peasants at the neighborhood gather-
ings in Idvor had taught me that; no other lesson had
ev^er made a deeper impression upon me.

II

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN

My first night under the Stars and Stripes was spent
in Castb Garden. It was a glorious night, I thought ; no
howHng of the gales, no crashing of the waves, and no
tumbling motion of the world beneath my feet, such as
I had experienced on the immigrant ship. The feeling
of being on terra firma sank deep into my consciousness
and I slept the sound sleep of a healthy youth, although
my bed was a bare floor. The very early morning saw
me at my breakfast, enjoying a huge bowl of hot coffee
and a big chunk of bread with some butter, suppHed by
the Castle Garden authorities at Uncle Sam's expense.
Then I started out, eager to catch a ghmpse of great New
York, feeling, in the words of the psahnist, ^^as a strong
man ready to run a race.'' An old lady sat near the gate
of Castle Garden offering cakes and candies for sale. A
piece of prune pie caught my eye, and no true Serb can
resist the allurements of prunes. It is a national sweet-
meat. I bought it, paying five cents for it, the only money
I had, and then I made a bee-hne across Battery Park,
at the same time attending to my pie. My first bargain
in America proved a failure. The prune pie was a de-
ception; it was a prune pie filled with prune pits, and I
thought of the words of my fellow passenger on the im-
migrant ship who had said: ^^No matter who you are or
what you know or what you have you will be a greenhorn
when you land in America." The prune-pie transaction
whispered into my ear: ''jMichael, you are a greenhorn;
this is the first experience in your life as a greenhorn.
Cheer up ! Get ready to serve your apprendceship as a

43

44 tROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

greenhorn before you can establish your claim to any
recognition/' repeating the words of my prophetic fellow
passenger who had served his apprenticeship in America.
No prophet ever uttered a truer word.

The old Stevens House, a white building with green
window-shutters, stood at the corner of Broadway and
Bowling Green. When I reached this spot and saw the
busy beehive called Broadway, with thousands of tele-
graph-wires stretching across it like a cobweb between
huge buildings, I was overawed, and wondered what it
meant. Neither Budapest, nor Prague, nor Hamburg
had looked anything hke it. My puzzled and panicky
expression and the red fez on my head must have at-
tracted considerable attention, because suddenly I saw
myself surrounded by a small crowd of boys of all sizes,
jeering and laughing and pointing at my fez. They were
newsboys and bootblacks, who appeared to be anxious
to have some fun at my expense. I was embarrassed
and much provoked, but controlled my Serbian temper.
Presently one of the bigger fellows walked up to me and
knocked the fez off my head. I punched him on the nose
and then we clinched. My wrestUng experiences on the
pasturelands of Idvor came to my rescue. The bully
was down in a jiffy, and his chums gave a loud cheer of
ringing laughter. I thought it was a signal for general
attack, but they did not touch me nor interfere in any
way. They acted like impartial spectators, anxious to
see that the best man won. Suddenly I felt a powerful
hand pulling me up by the collar, and when I looked up
I saw a big official with a club in his hand and a fierce
expression in his eye. He looked decidedly unfriendly,
but after hstening to the appeals of the newsboys and
bootblacks who witnessed the fight he softened and handed
me my fez. The boys who a little while before had jeered
and tried to guy me, evidently appealed in my behalf
when the policeman interfered. They had actually be-

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 45

come my friends. When I walked away toward Castle
Garden, with my red fez proudly cocked up on my head,
the boys cheered. I thought to myself that the unpleas-
ant incident was worth my while, because it taught me
that I was in a country where even among the street
urchins there was a strong sentiment in favor of fair play
even to a Serbian greenhorn. America was different from
Austria-Hungary. I never forgot the lesson and never
had a single reason to change my opinion.

A gentleman who had witnessed the fight joined me
on miy return trip to Castle Garden, and when we reached
the empIo}Tiient bureau he offered me a job. When I
learned that one of my daily duties would be to milk a
cow, I refused. According to Serb traditions, milking a
cow is decidedly a feminine job. Another gentleman, a
Swiss foreman on a Delaware farm, offered me another
job, which was to drive a team of mules and help in the
work of hauling things to the field preparatory for spring
planting. I accepted gladly, feehng confident that I
knew all about driving animals, although I had never
even seen a mule in all my experiences in Idvor. We
left for Philadelphia that forenoon and caught there the
early afternoon boat for Delaware City, where we arrived
late in the afternoon.

As we passed through Philadelphia I asked the Swiss
foreman whether that was the place where a hundred
years before famous Benjamin Franklin flew his kite,
and he answered that he had never heard of the gentle-
man, and that I must have meant William Penn. ^^No,"
said I, ^^ because I never heard of this gentleman." ^' You
have still to learn a thing or two about American history,"
said the Swiss foreman, with a superior air. ''Yes, in-
deed," I said, ''and I intend to do it as soon as I have
learned a thing or two about the English language";
and I wondered whether the Swiss foreman who had
never heard of Benjamin Franklin and his kite had really

46 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

learned a thing or two in American history, although he
had hved some fifteen years in the United States.

There were quite a number of farmers on the Delaware
boat, every one of them wearing a long goatee but no
mustache; such was the fashion at that time. Every
one of them had the brim of his slouch hat turned down,
covering his eyes completely. As they conversed they
looked Hke wooden images; they made no gestures and
I could not catch the expression of their hidden eyes;
without these powerful aids to the understanding of the
spoken word I could not make out a single syllable in
their speech. The Enghsh language sounded to me like
an inarticulate mode of speech, just as inarticulate as
the joints of those imperturbable Delaware farmers. I
wondered whether I should ever succeed in learning a
thing or two in this most pecuUar tongue. I thought of
the peasants at the neighborhood gatherings in Idvor, and
of their winged words, each of which found its way straight
into my soul. There also appeared before my mental
vision the image of Baba Batikin, with fire in his eye and
a vibratory movement of his hand accompanying his
stirring tales of Prince Marko. How different and how
superior those peasants of Idvor appeared to me when I
compared them with the farmers on that Delaware boat !
"Impossible," said I, "that a Serb peasant should be so
much superior to the American peasant!'^ Something
wrong with my judgment, thought I, and I charged it to
my being a greenhorn and unable to size up an American
farmer.

At the boat-landing in Delaware City a farm-wagon
was awaiting us, and we reached the farm at supper-time.
The farm-buildings were fully a mile from the town, stand-
ing all by themselves; there was no village and there were
no neighbors, and the place looked to me like a camp.
There was no village life among i\merican farmers, I was
told, and I understood then why those farmers on the

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 47

Delaware boat were so devoid of all animation. The
farm-hands were all young fellows, but considerably
older than myself, and when the foreman introduced me
to them, by my Christian name, I found that most of
them spoke German with a Swiss accent, the same which
the foreman had who brought me from New York. One
of them asked me how long I had been in the country,
and when I told him that I was about twenty-four hours
in the country, he smiled and said that he thought so,
evidently on account of the unmistakable signs of a green-
horn which he saw all over me.

The first impression of an American farm was dismal.
In the messroom, however, where supper was served,
everything was neat and lovely, and the supper looked
to me hke a holiday feast. I became more reconciled to
the American farm. The farm-hands ate much and spoke
very Httle, and when they finished they left the dining-
room without any ceremony. I was left alone, and moved
my chair close to a warm stove and waited for somebody
to tell me what to do next. Presently two women came
in and proceeded to clear the supper-table; they spoke
Enghsh and seemed to pay no attention to me. They
probably thought that I was homesick and avoided dis-
turbing me. Presently I sav/ a young girl, somewhat
younger than myself. She pretended to be helping the
women, but I soon discovered that she had another mis-
sion. Her appearance reminded me of a young Vila, a
Serbian fairy, who in the old Serbian ballads plays a most
wonderful part. No hero ever perished through misfor-
tune who had the good fortune to win the friendship of
a Vila. Supernatural both in intelligence and in physical
skill, the Vilae could always find a way out of every dif-
ficulty. I felt certain that if there ever was a Vila this
young girl was one. Her luminous blue eyes, her finely
chiselled features, and her graceful movements made a
strange impression upon me. I imagined that she could

48 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

hear the faintest sound, that she could see in the darkest
night, and that, Uke a real Vila, she could feel not only
the faintest breezes but even the thoughts of people near
her. She certainly felt my thoughts. Pointing to a table
in a corner of the dining-room, she directed my attention
to writing-paper and ink, placed there for the convenience
of farm-hands. I understood her meaning, although I
did not understand her words. I spent the evening writ-
ing a letter to my mother. This was my wish, and the
Vila must have read it in my face.

One of the farm-hands, a Swiss, came in after a while
in order to remind me that it was bedtime and to inform
me that early in the morning he would wake me up and
take me to the barn, where my job would be assigned to
me. He kept his word, and with lantern in hand he took
me long before sunrise to the barn and introduced me to
two mules which he put in my charge. I cleaned them
and fed them while he watched and directed; after break-
fast he showed me how to harness and hitch them up.
I took my turn in the line of teams hauling manure to
the fields. He warned me not to apply myself too zeal-
ously to the work of loading and unloading, until I had
become gradually broken in, otherwise I should be laid
up stiff as a rod. The next day I was laid up, stiffer than
a rod. He was much provoked, and called me the worst
'^ greenhorn" that he ever saw. But, thanks to the skilled
and tender care of the ladies on the farm, I was at my job
again two days later. My being a greenhorn appealed
to their sympathy; they seemed to have the same kind
of soul which I had first observed in my American friends
who paid my fare from Vienna to Prague.

One of my mules gave me much trouble, and the more
he worried me the more amusement he seemed to furnish
to the other farm-hands, rough immigrants of foreign
birth. He did not bite, nor did he kick, as some of the
mules did, but he protested violently against my putting

THE H.4lRDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 49

the bridle on his head. The other farm-hands had no
advice to offer; they seemed to enjoy my perplexity. I
soon discovered that the troublesome mule could not
stand anybody touching his ears. That was his ticklish
spot. I finally got around it; I never took his bridle off
on working-days, but only removed the bit, so that he
could eat. On Sunday mornings, however, when I had
all the time I wanted, I took his bridle off, cleaned it,
and put it on, and did not remove it again for another
week. The foreman and the superintendent discovered
my trick and approved of it, and so the farm-hands lost
the amusement which they had had at my expense every
morning at the harnessing hour. I noticed that they
were impressed by my trick and did not address me by
the name of greenhorn quite so often. They were also
surprised to hear me make successful attempts to speak
English. Nothing counts so much in the immigrant's
bid for promotion to a grade above that of a greenhorn
as the knowledge of the English language. In these ef-
forts I received a most unexpected assistance, and for
that I was much indebted to my red fez.

On every trip from the barnyard to the fields, my mules
and I passed by the superintendent's quarters, and there
behind the wall of neatly piled-up cord-wood I observed
every now and then the golden curls of my American Vila.
She cautiously watched there, just like a Serbian Vila
at the edge of a forest. My red fez perched up on a high
seat behind the mules obviously attracted and amused
her. Whenever I caught her eye I saluted in regular
Balkan fashion, and it was a salute such as she had never
seen before in the State of Delaware. Her curiosity
seemed to grow from day to day, and so did mine.

One evening I sat alone near the warm stove in the
messroom and she came in and said: ^^Good evening!"
I answered by repeating her greeting, but pronounced it
badly. She corrected me, and, when I repeated her greet-

50 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ing the second time, I did much better, and she applauded
my genuine effort. Then she proceeded to teach me Eng-
hsh words for everything in the dining-room, and before
that first lesson was over I knew some twenty English
words and pronounced them to her satisfaction. The
next day I repeated these words aloud over and over
again during my trips to the fields, until I thought that
even the mules knew them by heart. At the second les-
son on the following evening I scored a high mark from
my teacher and added twenty more words to my English
vocabulary. As time went on, my vocabulary increased
at a rapid rate, and my young teacher was most enthu-
siastic. She called me ''smart,^' and I never forgot the
word. One evening she brought in her mother, who two
weeks previously had taken care of me when I was laid
up from overzealous loading. At that time she could
not make me understand a single word she said. This
time, however, I had no difficulty, and she was greatly
surprised and pleased. My first examination in Enghsh
was a complete success.

At the end of the first month on the Delaware farm
my confidence in the use of the English language had
grown strong. During the second month I grew bold
enough to join in lengthy conversations. The super-
intendent's wife invited me often to spend the evening
with the family. My tales of Idvor, Panchevo, Buda-
pest, Prague, Hamburg, and the immigrant ship interested
them much, they said. My pronunciation and grammar
amused them even more than they were willing to show.
They were too polite to indulge in unrestrained laughter
over my Serbian idioms. During these conversations the
Vila sat still and seemed to be all attention. She was
all eyes and ears, and I knew that she was making mental
notes of every mistake in my grammar and pronunciation.
At the next lesson she would correct every one of these
mistakes, and then she v/atched at the next family gather-

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 51

ing to see whether I should repeat them. But I did not;
my highest ambition was to show myself worthy of the
title ^ ' smart '^ which she had given me.

One evening I was relating to the superintendent's
family how I had refused the first offer of a job at Castle
Garden, because I did not care to accept the daily duty
of milking a cow, which, according to my Serbian notions,
was a purely feminine job. I admitted that Serbian and
American notions were entirely different in this partic-
ular respect, because, although over a hundred cows were
milked daily on the farm, I never saw a woman in any
one of the m^any barns, nor in the huge creamery. I con-
fessed also that both the Vila and her mother would be
entirely out of place not only in the cow-barns but even
in the scrupulously clean creamery, adding that if the
Vila had been obliged to attend to the cows and to the
creamery, she would not have found the time to teach me
Enghsh, and, therefore, I preferred the American cus-
tom. Vila's mother was highly pleased with this remark
and said: '^ Michael, my boy, you are beginning to under-
stand our American ways, and the sooner you drop your
Serbian notions the sooner you will become an American. '^

She explained to me the position of the American
woman as that of the educator and spiritual guide of the
coming generation, emphasizing the fact that the vast
majority of teachers in American primary schools were
women. This information astonished and pleased me,
because I knew that my mother was a better teacher
than my schoolmaster, an old man with a funny nasal
twang. Her suggestion, however, that I should drop my
Serbian notions and become an American as soon as pos-
sible disturbed me. But I said nothing; I was a green-
horn only and did not desire to express an opinion which
might clash with hers. I thought it strange, however,
that she took it for granted that I wished to become an
American.

52 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

The next day was Sunday, and I walked to church,
which was in Delaware City. The singing of hymns did
not impress me much, and the sermon impressed me even
less. Delaware City was much bigger than my native
Idvor, and yet the rehgious service in Idvor was more
elaborate. There was no choral singing in the church
of Delaware City, and there were no ceremonies with a
lot of burning candles and the sweet perfume of burning
incense, and there was no ringing of harmonious church-
bells. I was disappointed, and wondered why Vila's
mother expected me to drop my Serbian notions and em-
brace America's ways, which, so far as public worship
was concerned, appeared to me as less attractive than
the Serbian ways. Vila's family met me in front of the
church and asked me to ride home with them. A farm-
hand riding in a fine carriage with his employer struck
me as extraordinary, and I wished to be excused, but
they insisted. No rich peasant in Idvor would have done
that. In this respect Delaware farmers with their Amer-
ican ways appealed to me more. Another surprise was
in store for me: Vila's mother insisted that I share with
the family their Sunday dinner, just as I had shared with
them the divine service. I saw in it an effort on her part
to show an appreciation of my religious habit and to en-
courage it, thus proving in practice what she preached
to me about the spiritual influence of the American
woman. During the dinner I described the Sundays of
Idvor, dwelhng particularly upon the custom among the
Serbian boys and girls of kolo dancing on the village green
in front of the church on Sunday afternoons. Vila ap-
proved of the custom enthusiastically, but her mother
thought that a walk through the peach-orchards, which
were then in full bloom, was at least as good. Vila and
I walked together that Sunday afternoon. My atten-
dance at church gained for me this favor also.

He who has never seen the Delaware peach -orchards

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 53

of those days in full bloom, when in the month of May
the ground is a deep velvety green, and when the South-
ern sk}^ seen through the golden atmosphere of a sunny
May day reminds one of those mysterious landscapes which
form the background in some of Raphael's Madonna
pictures — he who has never seen that glorious sight does
not know the heavenly beauty of this Httle earth. No
painter would dare attempt to put on canvas the cloth
of flaming gold which on that balmy Sunday afternoon
covered the ripples of the sun-kissed Delaware River.
Vila asked me whether I had ever seen anything more
beautiful in Idvor, and I said no, but added that nothing
is as lovely and as sweet as one's native village. When
I informed her that some day I expected to return to it,
enriched by my experiences in America, she looked sur-
prised and said:

Then you do not intend to become an American?''
No," said I; and after some hesitation I added: ^^T
ran away from the mihtary frontier because the rulers of
the land wanted to transform me into a Hungarian; I
ran away from Prague because I objected to Austrian
Teutonism; I shall run away from Delaware City also
if, as your good mother suggested, 1 am expected to drop
my Serbian notions and become an American. My
mother, my native village, my Serbian orthodox faith,
and my Serbian language and the people who speak ifc
are my Serbian notions, and one might as well expect
me to give up the breath of my life as to give up my Ser-
bian notions."

''You misunderstood my mother, Michael," said the
Vila; ''she only referred to your notions about woman's
work, and you know that European women are expected
to do the hard work for which only men are strong
enough."

"Very true," said I; "the strongest and ablest men in
Europe spend the best part of their Hves on battle-fields.

54 l^ROM IMM GUAM r TO INVENTOR

or training for the battle-fields; this is particularly true
of the Serbian people. This forces our Serbian women
to do some of the hard work which men should do." This
gave me a fitting opportunity to say a few things in favor
of the spiritual influence of the Serbian women by de-
scribing the position of the Serbian woman as she is rep-
resented in the Serbian ballads — of Chuchuk Stana, the
wife of Hayduk Velyko, who urged her hero husband
to sacrifice his hfe rather than surrender the eastern fron-
tier of Serbia, which, during the Serbian revolution, he
was defending against vastly superior Turkish forces; of
the maid of Kossovo, who at the risk of her Hfe and liberty
visited the battle-field of Kossovo in order to administer
the last spiritual aid to the fallen and dying heroes; of
Yevrosima, mother of Prince Marko, the national hero
of the Serbian race, whose counsel and advice were the
only guiding star to Marko throughout his stormy Hfe.
I told her also that I should not be a witness to that
heavenly scene on the banks of the Delaware that Sun-
day afternoon if it had not been for my mother, who had
urged me to go into the world and learn new things, which
I could not learn in my native peasant village. Young
Vila was much impressed by my Serbian tales, and by
my pleading in behalf of the Serbian women, and then
she asked me whether I had ever heard of Martha Wash-
ington, the wife of George Washington, the national hero
of America. I confessed complete ignorance. Pointing to
the golden ripples of the sun-kissed Delaware River, she
said that it did not always look as bright and peaceful,
and then described its appearance when in the middle
of winter its surface is covered with broken ice, which,
tossed by the waves of the angry river, makes a passage
across it next to impossible. But in January, 1777, George
Washington, the commander of the retreating American
armies, crossed it, and on the other side of the river, near
Trenton, surprised the advancing victorious British armies

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 55

and defeated them, turning American defeat into Amer-
ican victory. ^'Washington," she said, ^'just like Hay-
duk Velyko, was ready to sacrifice his Hfe while crossing
the treacherous ice-fields of the angry Delaware in order
to strike a timely blow for the safety of his country."
And she was inchned to believe, she said, that Martha
Washington acted at that critical moment just as
Chuchuk Stana did. From that day on, Washington was
to me the Hayduk Velyko of America, and the name of
the Delaware River inspired me always with thoughts of
deep veneration. Vila showed me that America, like
Serbia, was also a land of heroes. The rest of that glori-
ous Sunday afternoon was spent in Vila's answering my
numerous questions concerning George Washington and
the war of the American Revolution. It was the most
inspiring afternoon which I had experienced in America,
and I felt that, after all, there might be many things in
America which were just as great as those great things
of which the Serbian guslar sings in the national ballads
of Serbia. Vila had succeeded in welding the first hnk
between my Serbian traditions and the traditions of Amer-
ica. I apologized to her for misunderstanding her mother's
suggestion that I become an American as soon as pos-
sible, and confessed that I was much less anxious than
I had thought I was a few moments before to run away
from the shores of the historic Delaware.

After Vila discovered my hvely interest in American
history, she continued her English lessons to me by telling
me stories relating to early American history, which I
repeated to her. Jamestown, South St. Mary, in southern
Maryland, and Virginia figured big in these tales. T\Tien
I first heard of the Mayflower, a year or so later, and of
its landing at Plymouth Rock, I wondered why Vila never
mentioned that great historical event. She never men-
tioned Lincoln, and changed conversation when I once
called him the American Prince Marko. America north

56 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of the Delaware River was very little in her mind, and
even Philadelphia was mentioned only on account of the
Liberty Bell and the Declaration of Independence.

One evening, Vila's mother asked me about my mother
and her hopes for my future. Remembering her remarks
concerning the spiritual influence of the American women
upon the coming generation, I gave her a glowing account
of my mother, and wound up by saying that she did not
expect me to become an American farmer, and that I
came to America to learn what I could not learn in a peas-
ant country like that of my native village. She was much
touched, and then in simple and solemn language she
revealed to me a new truth which I never forgot and which
I found confirmed by all my experiences in this great land,
the truth, namely, that this is a country of opportunities
which are open equally to all; that each individual must
seek these opportunities and must be prepared to make
good use of them when he finds them. She commended
me warmly for making good use of all the opportunities
which I had found on the farm, and advised me strongly
to go in search of new opportunities. Vila agreed with
her, and I prepared to leave the hospitable shores of Dela-
ware.

I made my return trip to Philadelphia on the same
boat which had brought me to Delaware City. Things
looked different from what they had on my first trip.
The farmers of Delaware, my fellow passengers on the boat,
did not look like wooden images, and their speech was
not inarticulate. I understood their language, and its
meaning found a sympathetic response in me. The trip
reminded me much of the trip on the Danube some eigh-
teen months prior to that time. One of my fellow
passengers, a youngster of about my age, pointed out a
place to me which he called Trenton, and assured me
that the boat was passing over the spot where Washing-
ton crossed the Delaware. His geography was faulty as

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 57

I found out much later. But it was swallowed by a green-
horn like me and it thrilled me, and I remembered then
the first view of the Cathedral of Karlovci, the seat of the
Serbian Patriarch, which was pointed out to me from the
Danube boat by the theological students. I felt the same
thrill in each case, and I knew that America was getting
a hold upon my Serbian heart-strings. My appearance
attracted no attention, either on the boat or at Philadel-
phia after we landed. My hat and clothes were Ameri-
can, but my heavy top-boots, so useful on the farm,
were somewhat too heavy for the warm June days in
Philadelphia.

The Swiss foreman had directed me to a Swiss acquaint-
ance of his who had a small hotel in Philadelphia. He
was very eager to have me take all my meals at the hotel,
but my total capital of ten dollars made me cautious; be-
sides, my days from early morning till late at night were
spent in the heart of the city. No other human being
ever saw so m^uch of Philadelphia during a stay of five
days as I did, hunting for a job, searching new oppor-
tunities, as Vila's mother expressed it. But I searched
in vain. I gained new information about William Penn
and Benjamin Franklin and saw many buildings the his-
tory of which is attached to these two great names, and
I wondered why Benjamin Franklin ever deserted Boston
to search new opportunities in a place hke Philadelphia.
But he did it, and succeeded. I was sure that neither he
nor any other human being could walk more or chase
after a job more diligently than I did, but then he was an
American boy and he had a trade, and I was a Serbian
greenhorn who did not know anything in particular, except
how to drive a pair of mules. Besides, thought I, Phila-
delphia might have lost its wealth of opportunities since
Franklin's days. Such was my consolation while resting
on a bench in Faimiount Park, near the grounds which
were being prepared for the Centennial Exposition of

58 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

1876. I was lunching on a chunk of bread and thinking
what would happen when the last three dollars, the rem-
nant of my ten dollars which I brought from the Delaware
farm, disappeared. A husky farmer approached me and
addressed me in English, asking whether I wanted a job.
"I do,'^ said I; ^'I have been chasing after one nearly a
week, and I can't chase much longer, because I see that
my weary farm-boots are showing many signs of distress
in their long daily struggles against these hot Philadelphia
pavements."

A day later found me in South St. Mary, in southern
Maryland. I expected great things here, having heard
so much of its early history from Vila. I was engaged
to drive a pair of mules, dragging cultivators through
corn and tobacco fields. As far as skill and physical exer-
tion were concerned, the job was easy. But the climate
was deadly, and social hfe was even more so. The only
interesting people whom I found there were those buried
in the old cemetery, some two hundred years prior to
that time, when South St. Mary was quite an important
place, and when the original settlers brought many fine
things from England, and even bricks with which they
built their houses. The only diversion I found was to
read the legends on the tombstones in the old cemetery
near the village church. Chesapeake Bay and the Poto-
mac River and the many inlets of the bay bordered by
luxuriant vegetation gave the country a most picturesque
appearance. The flourishing corn and tobacco fields
suggested prosperity, but the only people who stirred
and showed any activity were darkies, whose language I
could not understand. I felt that as far as human speech
was concerned, I was in a valley of silence, although the
air was full of incessant sounds from all kinds of insects
and water-animals. Mosquitoes, gnats, and flies, and
the most oppressive, almost tropical, heat of the sun
made work in the fields unbearable. Many a time while

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 59

driving the phlegmatic mules through the broiling at-
mosphere of the tobacco-fields I thought of the icy blasts
of the North Atlantic which I had experienced on the
immigrant ship less than three months before, and I
prayed that one of those icy breaths of the polar regions
might wander astray and reach the flatlands of Chesa-
peake Bay. My prayer was not heard, and I was happy
to be still alive at the end of the month, and then I took
my wages of fifteen dollars and made a bee-line for the
north. I hoped that in New York I might be able to catch
some of the cold North Atlantic breezes and, after cooling
off, pick up one of the many opportunities in the metrop-
ohs, which on the day when the immigrant ship landed
me at Hoboken seemed to be seething with hfe and ac-
tivity and brimful of all kinds of opportunities.

The Chesapeake boat landed me at Baltimore in the
early hours of a Sunday morning, and the sound of beau-
tifully tuned church-bells greeted me. I was told that
Baltimore was a Cathohc city and that the bells belonged
to a Catholic cathedral. They almost persuaded me to
stay in Baltimore and become a Roman Cathohc, so sweet
and soothing was their effect upon my soul. It recalled
to my memory the lovely harmony of the church-bells
of my native Idvor, and with that memory there appeared
in my imagination the vision of my strongly orthodox
mother and of St. Sava. This vision reminded me that
I must say good-by to Roman Catholic Baltimore.

Forty- two years later I met Cardinal Gibbons in Balti-
more during a visit to that city, when Johns Hopkins
University conferred upon me the honorary LL.D. de-
gree. I told him of the incident just referred to; he was
in a jocular mood and said: ^'Too bad that you did not
yield to the first effect of the Baltimore church-bells; you
might be to-day the archbishop of this diocese, and per-
haps even a cardinal." ''But, in that case, I should not
have to-day the honorary LL.D. degree of Johns Hop-

60 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

kins; I would not exchange that for any other honor,"
said I, returning jest for jest and watching the merry
twinkle in the cardinal's fluorescent eyes. Some months
later President Butler, of Columbia University, and I
happened to be descending in the same lift at the Shore-
ham Hotel in Washington. Presently Cardinal Gibbons
entered, and President Butler introduced me to his Emi-
nence, who, recalling our former meeting in Baltimore,
said, ^^I know Professor Pupin, and it is a great honor,
indeed, to ride in the same lift with two eminent men
who carry so many distinguished academic honors," and,
as he looked at me with a genial smile which was brimful
of Irish humor, I knew that he wished to remind me in
a good-natured way of my high rating of an honorary
Johns Hopkins degree in comparison with the honors
attached to the titles of archbishop and cardinal.

The Pennsylvania train from Baltimore to New York
dehvered me to a ferry-boat, which landed me on West
Street, where I found a small hotel kept by a German,
a native of Friesland. He was a rugged old fellow who
loved his low-German dialect, which I did not understand.
He spoke in Enghsh to me, which, according to his son
Christian, was much worse than mine, although he had
been in America some twenty years. Christian was a
yellow-haired and freckle-faced lad, of about my age,
and we hit it off very well, forming a cross-matched team.
He would have given anything, he said, to have my black
hair and dark-red complexion. His almost white eye-
brows and eyelashes and mischievous gray eyes and yel-
low freckles fascinated me. He was born in Hoboken
and understood his father's low-German dialect, but
whenever addressed in it, by his father or by the Fries-
land sailors who frequented his father's inn, he always
answered in English, or, as he called it, ^'United States."
Christian managed somehow to get away every now
and then from the httle hotel and to accompany me on

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 61

my many long errands in search of a job. His familiarity
with the town helped me much to master the geography
of New York, and to find out what's what and who's
who in the great metropolis. He seemed to be the only
opportunity which New York offered to me, and it was
a great one. Every other opportunity which appeared
in newspaper advertisements had hundreds of apphcants,
and they were lined up at the place of the promised oppor-
tunity, no matter how early Christian and I reached the
place. I was quite sure that those opportunity-chasers
lined up soon after the first issue of the morning papers.
I was told that the year before (in 1873) occurred the
Black Friday panic, and that New York had not yet
recovered from it. There were thousands of unemployed,
although it was summer. One morning Christian told
me that he had found a fine job for me, and he took me
to a tug anchored quite near his father's hotel. There
were quite a number of husky laborers on the tug, which
took us to the German docks in Hoboken. We were to
stay there and help in the loading of ships, replacing the
longshoremen who Vv'ere on strike. The job assigned to
me was to assist the sailors who w^ere painting the ship
and things on the ship. We never left the docks until
the strike was over, which lasted about three w^eeks. At
its termination I was paid and the tug delivered me to
the little hotel on West Street, where Christian received
me with open arms. I had thirty dollars in my pocket,
and Christian told me that I looked as rich as Commo-
dore Vanderbilt, whom Christian considered to be the
richest man in New York. Christian took me to Chatham
Square to buy a new suit of clothes and other wearing
apparel, and I thought that the Jewish clothing dealers
would cause a riot fighting for my patronage. The next
day when I appeared at the breakfast-table in my new
togs. Christian's father could hardly recognize me, but
when he did he slapped me on the back and exclaimed:

62 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

^'Who would ever think that you are a Serbian green-
horn?'' '^Nobody/' said Christian, resenting his father's
remark, and then he added with some hesitation: ^'But
who would ever think that you are not a German green-
horn?" Christian's father rebuked him and assured me
that he meant no offense when he jokingly called me a
Serbian greenhorn.

Christian was anxious to have me replenish my for-
tune, which was considerably reduced by my purchases
in Chatham Square. He called my attention that morn-
ing to a big German who was drinking beer at the hotel
bar after delivering several baskets filled with bread,
rolls, and pies, and said that he was a rich and stingy
baker, whose wagon, standing in front of the hotel, needed
painting badly. I saw that the lettering needed speedy
restoration. I assured my chum that my experience as
assistant to the sailor painters on the Hoboken docks,
in addition to my natural skill in free-hand drawing,
qualified me for the job of restoring the lettering; Chris-
tian chuckled and made a bee-fine for the stingy German
baker. I got the contract to restore the lettering for five
dollars and my meals, he to pay for the paints and the
brushes, which v/ere to remain my property. Christian
fonnulated the contract and specified its terms very
clearly; he was my business manager, and he enjoyed
it hugely. The next day I lunched with the baker's fam-
ily, according to the terms of the contract, and after
luncheon, as soon as the wagon had returned from its
daily route, I started the work, interrupted by the supper
only, and at nine o'clock in the evening the job was
finished to the full satisfaction of the party of the first
part. That evening found me richer by five dollars, sev-
eral paint pots and brushes, a huge home-made apple
pie, and a new and encouraging experience. Christian,
for some reason unknown to me at that time, seemed to
look upon the whole affair as a joke, but nevertheless he

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 63

paid many compliments to my success as an artist. The
next day we left bright and early for his father's house
in Hoboken, where in accordance with a plan conceived
by Christian we were to spend some time in painting
and papering several of the rooms. Profiting by the in-
structions which we received in sundry places, and after
making several unsuccessful attempts, we managed to
master the art and to finish the rooms to the full satis-
faction of Christian's father, who confessed that no Ho-
boken expert could have done better. ''This painting is
much better than that which you did on the baker's
wagon," he said, ''because you added some dryer to the
paint." "Right you are," said Christian, "but I am to
blame, because I purposely avoided telling Michael to
use some dryer on the baker's wagon. I wanted to make
two jobs out of one." "There will be several jobs, I am
afraid," said Christian's father, "because on the day
after the lettering was done the baker's wagon was caught
in a shower and all the fresh paint has been washed off,
and the wagon looks like a show." Christian roared with
laughter, but seeing that I looked worried he whispered
in my ear: "Don't worry, it serves him right; he wanted
a twenty-dollar job done for five dollars, because he took
you for a greenhorn." Christian made a new arrange-
ment for the relettering of the wagon and I earned an-
other five dollars, but no home-made apple pie. The
German baker in Goerck Street was neither as cordial
nor as hospitable as he was before.

Christian encouraged me in the belief that I was a
painter and paper-hanger, and I felt that I had a trade;
that feehng gave me much confidence. Christian's men-
tal attitude was a revelation to me. He actually believed
that a boy can learn anything quickly and well enough
to earn a living, if he will only try. He certainly could
do anything, I thought, as I watched him in his little
carpenter-shop in Hoboken. He also had a lathe and

64 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

was quite expert in wood and metal turning, although he
never served apprenticeship, as they do in Europe, in
order to learn these things. When I told Christian that,
according to my information on the immigrant ship, I
was doomed to serve in America my apprenticeship as a
greenhorn, he said that a European greenhorn must have
told me that, and added, in an offhand manner, that I
would be a greenhorn as long only as I thought that I
was one. My description of a European apprenticeship
amused him much, and he called it worse than the slavery
which was abohshed here by the Civil War only a few
years prior to that date. When I asked him where he got
all those strange notions, he told me that these notions
were not strange but genuine American notions, and
that he first got them from his mother, who was a native
American. His father and his father's German friends,
he admitted, had the same notions as that greenhorn
on the immigrant ship. Christian certainly looked like
a Friesland German, but his thoughts, his words, and his
manner of doing things were entirely different from any-
thing I ever saw in Europe. He was my first glimpse of
an American boy, just as the Vila on the Delaware farm
was my first vision of an American girl, and her mother
my first ideal of a noble American woman. They were
the first to raise that mysterious curtain which prevents
the foreign-born from seeing the soul of America, and
when I caught a glimpse of it I loved it. It reminded me
of the soul of my good people in Idvor, and I felt much
more at home. The idea of being a greenhorn lost many
of its horrifying features.

Christian left New York during that autumn to go
into a shop in Cleveland. Without him, West Street
had no attractions for me. 1 moved to the East Side of
New York, so as to be near Cooper Union and its hos-
pitable library. I spent many hours in it after my days
of labor, or after my numerous unsuccessful daily trips

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 65

in search of empIo>Taent. It was my spiritual refuge
when things looked black and hopeless. As winter ap-
proached, jobs grew alarmingly scarce, and my money
was rapidly approaching the zero level. My hall-room
in Norfolk Street was cheerless and cold, worse even than
my little attic in Prague. Neither the room nor its neigh-
borhood attracted me in daytime; I preferred to walk
along the endless avenues. This exercise kept me warm
and gave me a chance to make frequent inquiries for a
job at painters' and paper-hangers' shops. Wlien the
prospects for work of this kind appeared hopeless, I struck
a new idea. Instead of walking more or less aimlessly,
in order to keep myself warm and familiarize myself with
the ways of the great city, I followed coal-carts, and when
they dropped the coal on the sidewalk I rang the bell
and offered my services to transfer the coal from side-
walk to cellar. I often got the job, which sometimes was
a stepping-stone to other less humble and more remunera-
tive employment. After placing the coal in the cellar
and getting my pay, I would often suggest to the owner
that his cellar and basement needed painting badly; most
cellars and basements do. The owner on being informed
that I was a painter out of work, a victim of the econom^ic
crisis, often yielded. The idea of a young and ambitious
painter being compelled to carry coal from sidewalk to
cellar at fifty cents a ton made a strong plea, stronger
than any eloquence could make. The scheme worked
well; it did not lead to afHuence, but my room-rent was
always paid on time, and I never starved. Often and
often, however, I had to keep my appetite in check. I
always had enough to buy my bowl of hot coffee and a
brace of crullers for breakfast in a restaurant on wheels,
stationed near Cooper Union, where Third Avenue car-
drivers took their coffee on cold winter mornings.

During periods of financial stringency my lunches were
a bowl of bean soup and a chunk of brown bread, which

66 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the Bowery Mission supplied for five cents. It was a
splendid meal on those cold winter days. But the Bowery
Mission supplied a prayer-meeting with red-hot speeches
as dessert; some of these addresses I really enjoyed; there
were speakers, however, who offended me, because they
confessed that they were reformed drunkards and god-
less men, and they assured their hearers, victims of the
economic crisis just like myself, that they would prosper
if they would only sign the pledge and vow to return to
Jesus. I neither drank nor had I ever deserted Jesus;
the reformed drunkard's views of human life depressed
me and drove me away from the Bowery Mission and
from the Bowery.

Carrying coal from sidewalks to cellars and shovelling
snow from sidewalks during that memorable winter were
healthful jobs and cheerful enough, but not very remu-
nerative; painting cellars and basements on Lexington
Avenue was more remunerative, but fearfully depressing.
To spend one's time day after day in dark cellars and
basements and pass the night in a cheerless hall-room in
Norfolk Street, surrounded by neighbors who were mostly
foreign-born of the most unattractive type, was too much
for a Serbian youth who knew the beautiful world as one
sees it from the pasture-lands of his native village and
from the banks of golden Delaware. The reading-room
of the Cooper Union library reheved somewhat my men-
tal depression, although it was packed with sad-looking
victims of the economic crisis, who found their way from
the Bowery to the reading-room in order to keep warm.
I longed to see God's world of the country again.

The opportunity came, and about the middle of April
of that year, 1875, I was on a farm in Dayton, New Jer-
sey. My employer's family consisted of his wife and an
elderly daughter, and I was the only farm-hand on the
place. They were apparently pleased with my work,
and the ladies took much interest in my personal welfare.

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 67

But the farmer, call him Mr. Brown, took it into his head
that a youth who had lived one whole winter in Norfolk
Street, New York, near the ungodly Bowery, needed
spiritual regeneration. He was a very pious Baptist, and
I soon discovered that in his everlasting professions of
omissions and commissions he was even w^orse than that
reformed drunkard whose sermons had driven me away
from the Bowery Mission and its vigorous bean soup.
Every Sunday his family took me to church twice and
made me sit between the female members of the family.
I felt that the congregation imagined that Mr. Brown
and his family were trying their best to convert a god-
less foreign youth and make a good Baptist out of him.
Mr. Brown seemed to be in a great hurry about it, be-
cause every evening he made me listen for an hour at
least to his reading of the Bible, and before we parted
for the night he would offer a loud and fervent prayer
that the Lord might kindle his light in the souls of those
who had been wandering in darkness. I know now that
he had in mind the words of St. Luke, ''To give light to
them that sit in darkness, '' but at that time I fancied
that he referred to my painting operations in the cellars
and basements of Lexington Avenue, and interpreted
his prayers as having a special reference to me.

The joy of hfe which during the day I inhaled in the
fresh fields of the early spring was smothered in the eve-
ning by Mr. Brown's views of religion, which were views
of a decrepit old man who thought of heaven only be-
cause he had no terrestrial problems to solve. He did
his best to strip rehgion of every vestige of its poetic
beauty, and of its soul-stirring spiritual force, and to
make it appear like a mummy of a long-departed Egyp-
tian corpse. A Serbian youth who looks to St. Sava,
the educator, and to the Serbian national ballads for an
interpretation of the Holy Scriptures, could not be ex-
pected to warm up for the rehgion which farmer Brown

68 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

preached. I thought of Vila and her mother on the banks
of the golden Delaware, and of the glorious opportunities
which they pointed out ahead of me, and I wondered
whether farmer Brown was one of these opportunities;
if so, then there were some opportunities in America from
which I wished to run away.

One Sunday evening, after the church service, farmer
Brown introduced me to some of his friends, informing
them that I was a Serbian youth who had not enjoyed
all the opportunities of American rehgious training, but
that I was making wonderful progress, and that some
day I might even become an active member of their con-
gregation. The vision of my orthodox mother, of the
Uttle church in Idvor, of the Patriarch in Karlovci, and
of St. Sava, shot before my eyes like a flash, and I vowed
to furnish a speedy proof that farmer Brown was wrong.
The next day I was up long before sunrise, having spent
a restless night formulating a definite plan of deliverance
from the intolerable boredom inflicted upon me by a
hopeless religious crank. The eastern sky was like a
veil of gold and it promised the arrival of a glorious April
day. The fields, the birds, the distant woods, and the
friendly country road all seemed to join in a melodious
hymn of praise to the beauties of the wanderer's freedom.
I bade good-by to the hospitable home of farmer Brown
and made a bee-line for the distant woods. There the
merry birds, the awakening buds on the blushing twigs,
and the little wild flowers of the early spring seemed to
long for the appearance of the glorious sun in the eastern
sky. I did not, because I was anxious to put as much
distance as possible between farmer Brown and myself
before he knew that I had departed. When the sun was
high in the heavens I made a halt and rested at the edge
of woods on the side of a hill. A meadow was at my feet,
and I, recalling the words of poet Nyegosh, watched for
^'ihe bright-eyed dewdrops to glide along the sunbeams

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 69

to the heavens above.'' The distant view as seen from
the elevation of my resting-place disclosed, near the hori-
zon, the silhouette of a town with towers and high roofs
looking hke roofs of churches. After some three additional
hours of wandering, I crossed a bridge over a canal and
found the distant town. There seemed to be one street
only where business was done; the rest of the town ap-
peared to me like so many beautiful convents. The tramp
of many miles through woods and meadows without any
breakfast had made me ravenously hungry and some-
what tired. The peaceful aspect of the monastic-looking
town invited me to sit down and rest and enjoy some
food. I bought a shining loaf of bread and, selecting a
seat under an elm near a building which looked Hke the
residence of the Archbishop of Prague, I started my break-
fast. It consisted of bread only, and I enjoyed it as I
had never enjoyed breakfast before. Many bo^^s, looking
like students, passed by on their v/ay to the ecclesiastical-
looking building; one of them watched my appetite as if
he envied it, and inquired whether I should like some
Italian cheese with my bread. He evidently thought
that I was an Italian, being misled b}^ my ruddy cheeks
and dark-brown hair. I answered that Serbian cheese
would suit me better. He laughed and said that Serbia
and Serbian cheese were unknown at Princeton. I an-
swered that some day perhaps Princeton might hear
from Serbia. It is a curious fact that, in 1914, I was the
nrst man who was invited to Princeton to cive an address
on the subject of the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia. The
late Moses Taylor Pyne was my host, and I pointed out
to him the elm in front of Nassau Hall where I had break-
fasted some forty years prior to that time. The students
received my address very enthusiastically; Dernburg
addressed them two weeks later, and their heckhng broke
up the meeting.

After finishins: the loaf, I basked in the warm rays of

70 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the mellow April sun, and fell asleep and dreamed that
in the building where the students went there was a large
assembly of people who had gathered there for the pur-
pose of conferring some academic honor upon me. When
I woke up, I thought of the letter which I had written
to my mother from Hamburg, a year before, promising
that I would soon return rich in learning and in distin-
guished honors. The dream reminded me that my promise
was carefully recorded in the mechanism which controlled
my consciousness.

Princeton was unlike anything that I had ever seen
up to that time. I had read about Hilendar, the famous
monastery on Mount Athos, on the ^gean Sea, founded
by St. Sava in the twelfth century. I had seen pictures
of its buildings, where monks lived the hfe of sohtude
and study. Princeton, with its many monastic-looking
buildings, I imagined was such a place, where young
men were given every opportunity to study and become
learned men so as to be able to devote their hves effec-
tively to such work as St. Sava did. As I wallced slowly
and thoughtfully toward the railroad-station, a student
met me and engaged me in conversation. He was a Ht-
tle older than myself; kindness and inteUigence beamed
from every feature of his handsome face. He knew a
great deal about Serbia, and even about the Serbs of
Austria-Hungary, and when I told him that I had come
to America in search of knowledge, he expressed the
hope that he might some day see me enrolled as a
student in Princeton. A student at Princeton! With
fellow students and friends like this divinely handsome
and gentle youth who accompanied me to the station !
Impossible! thought I, as I looked through the car-win-
dow and saw the academic halls of Princeton gradually
disappear in the distance and reahzed at the same time
that the train was taking me back to the Bowery. Eight
years later I read the letter which I wrote to my mother

THE HARDSHIPS OF A GREENHORN 71

describing Princeton, in which, in order to encourage
her, I had expressed a strong hope that some day I might
write to her and sign myself a student at Princeton.

I may add here that my good friend Henry Fairfield
Osborn, the distinguished scientist, was a sophomore at
Princeton during that year. He might have looked just
like that gentle youth who showed me the way to the
railroad-station. President Wilson entered Princeton in
the autumn of that year.

Ill

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP AS

GREENHORN

The visions of Princeton persisted in my mind like
after effects of strong light upon the retina. That gentle
youth's suggestion that he might some day see me en-
rolled as a student at Princeton kept ringing in my ears,
and sounded like mockery. A peasant boy from a Serb
village who a Httle over two years previously was wearing
a peasant's sheepskin coat and cap to become a fellow
student of those youths who looked like young aristocrats
seemed impossible. A European aristocrat would never
have suggested such a thing, and that puzzled me. I
saw an endless chain of difficult things between me and
my enrolment as a student at Princeton, the home for
gentle American youth. Social unpreparedness, I felt,
was a much more serious difficulty than unpreparedness
in things which one can learn from books. This difficulty
could not be overcome by associating with people east
of the Bowery, and I was heading that way. The nearer
the train approached New York the less anxious I was to
return to it. From Nassau Hall to the Bowery was too
abrupt a change, and from the Bowery to Nassau Hall
the change would have been even more abrupt. I com-
promised and looked up Christian's home on West Street.

Christian was still in Cleveland, but his father received
me with open arms and promised to find me a job. In
less than a week he found me one in a famous cracker
factory on Cortlandt Street. An acquaintance of his
wdth the name Filers, a Frieslander and distant relative
of a famous German writer of that name, was employed

72

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 73

there; he steered me during my first experiences in the
factory. A place was given me in a squad of boys and
girls who punched the firm's name upon a particular kind
of biscuit. The job was easy from the point of view of
physical strength, but it required much manual dexterity.
In spite of my ambition to advance to a high place in
the squad I progressed very slowly. I soon discovered
that in manual dexterity the American boys and girls
stood very high; my hands moved fairly rapidly after
some practice, but theirs vibrated. I made up my mind
that America was not a field in which I should gather
many laurels by efforts requiring much manual dexterity.
That idea had occurred to me before, when I first ob-
served Christian handling his lathe. One day I was at
the delivery desk of the Cooper Union Library, showing
my Hbrary check to a youth behind the desk who counter-
signed it before a book was delivered to me. I noticed
that he wrote rapidly, using sometimes his right hand
and sometimes his left with equal ease and with much
skill. ''How can I ever compete with American boys,''
said I, ''when they can write with either hand better
than I can write with my right hand !"

There never was a doubt in my mind that American
adaptability which I observed on every occasion v/as in
a great measure due to manual training which young
people used to get here. Christian's suggestion, men-
tioned above, that "a boy can learn anything quickly
and well enough to earn a living if he will only try," I
saw in a new light, when I watched the work of those
boys and girls in the factory. Yes, American boys can,
but not European, thought I. Lack of early manual
training was a handicap which I felt on every step dur-
ing my early progress in America. My whole experience
confirmed me in the belief that manual training of the
youth gives them a discipline which school-books alone
can never give. I discovered later that three of the great-

74 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

est characters in American history, Frankhn, Jefferson,
and Lincoln, excelled in practical arts requiring dexterity,
and that the constructive genius of the American nation
can, in part, be traced to the disciphne which one gets
from early manual training.

The great opportunities which, according to my good
friends on the Delaware farm, awaited me in this country
were certainly not in the direction of arts requiring great
manual dexterity. The country of baseball offered, I
thought, very few opportunities in this direction to a
foreign-born boy. I was convinced of that every time I
made a comparison between myself and the other boys
who were doing the same manual work in the factory
that I did. They were my superiors. In one thing, how-
ever, I thought I was their superior. They did not know
much about the latest things described in the Scientific
American, nor in the scientific supplements of the Sunday
Sun, which I read assiduously with the aid of a pocket
dictionary. The educational opportunities in the fac-
tory also escaped them. Jim, the boiler-room engineer
and fireman of the factory, became interested in my scien-
tific reading and encouraged me by paying several com-
pliments to my interest in these things. He once sug-
gested that some day, perhaps, I might become his
scientific assistant in the boiler-room, if I did not mind
shoveUing coal and attending to the busy fires. He was
joking, but I took him seriously. Every morning before
the factory started I was with Jim, who was getting the
steam up and preparing to blow the whistle and start
the wheels going. I volunteered to assist him ^^ shovelling
coal and attending to the busy fires," and after a time I
understood the manipulations in the boiler-room quite
well, according to Jim. The steam-engine excited my
liveliest interest. It was the first opportunity that I
had ever had to study at close range the operations of a
steam-engine, and I made the most of it, thanks to Jim^s

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 75

patient interest in my thirst for new information. He
was my first professor in engineering.

One exceptionally hot afternoon during that summer
found Jim prostrated by heat and I volunteered to run
the boiler-room until he got well. I did it during the
rest of that afternoon, much to the surprise of everybody,
but was not allowed to continue, because a fireman's
license was required for that. When Jim returned I urged
him to help me get a license, but he answered that an
intelligent boy, eager to learn, should not cross the At-
lantic for the purpose of becoming a fireman. '^You
must aim higher, my lad,'' said Jim, and he added that if
I continued to make good use of my pocket dictionary
and of my scientific reading I should soon outgrow the
opportunities offered by the New England Cracker Fac-
tory in Cortlandt Street. He never missed a chance to
encourage me and to promise new successes for new ef-
forts. In that respect he reminded me much of my
mother.

Jim was a humble fireman and boiler-room engineer;
his early education was scanty, so that he was not much
on books; but he stood in awe in the presence of books.
Referring to my habit of carrying a pocket dictionary in
my hip pocket and looking up in it the meaning and the
pronunciation of every word which was new to me, he
would exclaim, jokingly, '^Look in the book," whenever
some obscure points arose in our boiler-room discussions.
His admiration for books was much increased when I
related to him the story of James Watt and his experi-
ments with the steam-engine, a story which I had dug
out in an old encyclopaedia in the Cooper Union Library.
When I told him that James Watt had perfected his steam-
engine and thus started the development of the modern
steam-engine several years before the Declaration of
Independence, he dropped a remark which I never for-
got. He said: ''The Enghsh made us write the Declara-

76 FHOM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

tion of Independence, and they also gave us the steam-
engine with which we made our independence good.''
Jim was not much on learning but he was brimful of na-
tive practical philosophy.

Jim had a relative attending classes at Cooper Union
and encouraged me to join several of its evening classes,
which I did. I reported to him regularly the new things
which I learned there. This practice benefited me even
more than it did Jim, because in trying to explain to him
the laws of heat phenomena, which were explained to
me in the evening lectures at Cooper Union, I got a very
much better hold of them. The first ideas of sound and
light I caught on the pasture-lands of my native village;
the first ideas of the phenomena of heat I caught in the
boiler-room in Cortlandt Street and at Cooper Union
lectures. These lectures, supplemented by Jun's boiler-
room demonstrations, proved much more efi^ective than
the instruction which I had received from my teacher
Kos, in Panchevo. Kos was a Slovene, a native of that
beautiful valley in Carniola, in the very bosom of the
Dolomites; it is nearer to being an ideal dreamland than
any other spot in Europe. To Kos, as to every true Slav,
and particularly to the Slovenes of Carniola, the poetical
side of physical phenomena appealed most strongly.
Hence his patient listening to my enthusiastic profes-
sions of the belief that sound and light were different
forms of the language of God. But as I watched the
busy flames under Jim's boilers, and understood how
they were sustaining the strenuous efforts of steam to
supply every hustling wheel in the factory with driving
power, I understood for the first time that there is also
a prose in physics not a bit less impressive than its poetry.
It is this prose which interested Jim, the fireman, just as
it did the Cooper Union lecturer. Their chief concern
was what heat can do and not what it is. My Slavonic
craving for knowing what heat is was soon satisfied by

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 77

reading a poem in prose concerning the nature of heat.
But of that later.

During my very first visits to the Cooper Union Library
I saw a great painting hung up in the northwest corner
of its large reading-room. It was called ^^Alen of Prog-
ress/' and represented a group of very learned-looking
men. I admired the painting, but took no pains to find
out its meaning. One day, while reading in the Cooper
Union Library, I saw quite near me an old gentleman
standing and carefully scrutinizing what was going on.
I imagined, at first, that he had stepped out of that paint-
ing. I looked again and found that the figure in the paint-
ing which I fancied had walked out was still there and
that the old gentleman near me was undoubtedly the
original from which the artist had painted that figure.
The ambidextrous youth behind the library-desk told
me afterward that the old gentleman was Peter Cooper,
the founder of Cooper Union, and that he was one of the
group of famous men represented in the great painting.
He looked as I imagined the Patriarch of Karlovci must
have looked. He was a striking resemblance to St. Sava,
the Educator, as he is represented on an ikon in our church
in Idvor. The same snowy locks and rosy complexion of
saintly purity, and the same benevolent look from tvro
luminous blue eyes. Peter Cooper was then eighty-five
years of age, but he looked as lively as if he were going
to live another eighty-five years. His personality as re-
vealed by his appearance inspired me with awe, and I
read everything I could lay my hands on concerning his
life; then I read about the lives of the other great men
who were associated with Peter Cooper in that historical
painting. Some of these men were: Morse, the first pro-
moter of the electric telegraph; Joseph Henry, the great
physicist, head of the Smithsonian Institution, and
founder of scientific bureaus in Washington; McCormick,
the inventor of the reaper; Howe, the inventor of the

78 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

sewing-machine; Ericsson, the engineer of the Monitory
and so forth. My study of their hves was a timely prepa-
ration for my visit to Philadelphia, to see the Centennial
Exposition, the preparatory work for which I had seen
two years prior to that time, when, returning from the
Delaware farm, I stopped at Philadelphia to search for
opportunities.

The work of those great captains of industry forming
the group in the great painting, ^^Men of Progress,'^ was
in evidence in every nook and corner of the Centennial
Exposition. This great show impressed me as a splendid
glorification of all kinds of wonderful mechanisms, driven
by steam and animal power, which helped to develop
the great resources of the United States. All scientific
efforts exhibited there concerned themselves with the
question of what things can do, rather than what they are.
The show was also a glorification of the great men who
first formulated, clearly stated, and fought for the ideals
of the United States. I saw that fact proclaimed in many
of the historical features of the exposition, and I did not
fail to understand clearly that the show took place in
Philadelphia because the Liberty Bell and the Declara-
tion of Independence were first heard in Philadelphia.
When I left Philadelphia and its show I carried away in
my head a good bit of American history. The American-
ization process which was going on within me was very
much speeded up by what I saw at the Centennial Ex-
position.

On my return to New York I told Jim, the fireman,
that he was right when he said: "The Enghsh made us
write the Declaration of Independence, and they also
gave us the steam-engine with which we made our inde-
pendence good.'' But, instructed by my study of the
lives of men who were represented in the painting "Men
of Progress," and by what I learned at the Philadelphia
exposition of these men and of the leaders of the Amer-

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 79

ican Revolution, I suggested to Jim that the steam-engine
without great men behind it would have been of Httle
avail. ^^Yes," said Jim, ''the Declaration of Indepen-
dence without men of character and brains behind it
would also have been of little avail; and the great aims
of the Civil War without men like Lincoln and Grant
behind them would have ended in a foolish fizzle. This
country, my lad,'' exclaimed Jim with much waniith,
''is a monument to the lives of the men of brains and
character and action who made it." Jim threw out this
chunk of wisdom with the same ease and in the same
offhand manner which he displayed when he threw a few
shovelfuls of coal upon the busy fires under his boilers.
To him it was an obvious truth; to a lad like myself,
who was accustomed to look upon countries as monu-
ments to kings and princes and their victorious armies, it
was a revelation; and I said so. This brought from Jim
another epigrammatic remark to the effect that my trip
to America would teach me nothing if it did not teach
me first to squeeze out of my mind all fooHsh European
notions and make room for new ideas which I might pick
up here and there in this new world. Jim's sayings were
always short and to the point and their record in my
mind never faded.

Jim was very popular with everybody in the factory,
and the fact that he thought well of me improved my
standing much. A Mr. Paul, the youngest and most
active member of the New England Cracker Factory in
Cortlandt Street, paid frequent visits to the boiler-room.
I had an idea that Jim's views of things interested him
just as much as the operations of the boiler-room. One
morning he made a very early visit before the steam-
whistle had blown and the steam-engine had started on
its daily routine, and he found me in the boiler-room, a
busy volunteer fireman. Jim introduced me to him in a
jocular way as a student who found his way from Prince-

80 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ton to Ck)rtlandt Street, where in daytime I was rapidly
learning every trick of the biscuit industry while in the
evening I was absorbing all the wisdom of Cooper Union.
A few days later Mr. Paul informed me that my fame as
a painter of baker-wagons and of basements on Lexington
Avenue, and also my record as a student in mechanical
drawing in the evening classes of Cooper Union, had
reached the board of directors of the New England Cracker
Factory, and that they had resolved to offer me a new
job. I was advanced to the position of assistant to the
shipping clerk. It meant not only more pay but also
social advancement. I was no longer a workman in the
factory, w^ho worked for wages; I was a clerk who received
a salary. I felt as people in England probably feel when
peerage is conferred upon them. My fellow workers in
the factory, including Eilers, who first got me the job,
showed no envy. They agreed with Jim, who told them
that I was ^' smart.'' Jim used the same w^ord which my
Vila on the banks of the Delaware had used whenever I
made a good recitation in English, and I saw in it a good
omen. Jim and Vila and Christian of West Street were
my authorities, who expressed what I considered a com-
petent opinion upon my apprenticeship as greenhorn,
and that opinion was favorable. I felt assured that the
apprenticeship was soon coming to an end.

My duties as assistant to the shipping clerk were to
superintend the packing of biscuits, to help address with
brush and paint the boxes in which they were packed,
and to see to it that they were shipped on time. A squad
of some thirty girls did the packing and they seemed at
first inclined to file objections whenever I found fault
with their packing. They seemed to resent being bossed
by an immigrant youth whose foreign accent would ^'stop
a train," as they sometimes expressed it. I found out
from Jim that the principal object of their resentment
was to make me angry, because when my Serbian temper

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 81

was up my accent became most atrocious and that fur-
nished them a most hilarious amusement. I soon became
convinced that my success as assistant to the shipping
clerk demanded a perfect control of my temper and a
speedy improvement of my accent, each of them a most
difficult task.

My efforts to control my temper were frequently put
to severe tests. Now and then a biscuit, well aimed,
would hit me on the head, and my Serbian blood would
rush to my cheeks and I would look daggers at the sup-
posed offender. ^'Look at the bashibozouk," one of the
girls would sing out on these occasions, and another would
add: ^'Did you ever see such a Bulgarian atrocity?"
These words were in everybody's mouth at that time and
they referred to the incidents of the Balkan War of 1876-
1878, which Serbia, Montenegro, and Russia were waging
against the Turks. A third girl would stick her tongue
out and make funny faces at me in response to my savage
glare. She evidently tried to make me laugh, and I did
laugh. Then a fourth girl would sing out: ^^Oh, look at
the darling now; I just love him when he smiles. '^ Then
they all would sing:

"Smile, Michael, smile,
I love your sunny style."

I did smile, and every day I smiled more and more,
after I had discovered that the girls did not really dislike
me, but just loved to tease me whenever I showed any
signs of a European greenhorn. I dropped the airs put
on by European superiors in authority and gradually the
girls became friendly and began to call me by my first
name instead of mockingly addressing me as ^^ Mister" as
they addressed the old shipping clerk. ^'You are getting
on swimmingly, my lad," said Jim one day, and he added
something like this: ^^The girls are calling you Michael,
just as they call me Jim. We are popular, my boy, but

82 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

don't let this popularity mislead you into foolish notions.
Just watch me; I have enjoyed this popularity for twenty
years, and here I am still a bachelor, and an old bachelor
at that. You have controlled your temper well, but how
about controlhng your heart, my lad?" Jim grinned and
winked and placed his index finger in front of his forehead,
as if to indicate that many a wise experience is stored in
the practical head of a canny old fireman. I understood
his meaning, but did I heed its warning? I knew that it
contained a warning, and I suspected strongly that Jim
had discovered one of my deepest secrets.

There was one girl among the thirty biscuit-packers
who, in my opinion, never made a mistake in packing.
I never took pains to inspect her work, and why should
I when I was sure of her perfection ? But I watched her
and feasted my eyes upon her whenever 1 had spare time
and was sure that nobody was observing me. She be-
came conscious of it and every now and then she would
suddenly look up and catch my admiring but cautious
gaze. A bashful blush would give me away in spite of
my efforts to hide my thoughts and feehngs. She guessed
them and she smiled as if greatly pleased and much
amused, but she cleverly avoided giving me an oppor-
tunity to make a confession. I might have done it in
spite of my extreme bashfulness. My note-books were
full of her pictures, which I drew and signed under them
her name, Jane Macnamara. Perhaps Jim had seen these
pictures among my many sketches of the boiler-room
and its contents, and hence his warning to me.

One iNIonday morning Jane did not appear at her usual
place in the packing-room; her friend, another packing
girl, told me that Jane had been married on the previous
Saturday. I tried my best to appear as if I received the
news with indifference, but failed. The girls observed a
change; I neither smiled nor did I frown, but I thought a
lot, and the girls seemed to take quite an interest in my

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 83

thoughtfulness, but studiously avoided annoying me.
Only now and then one of the girls would whisper to me:
'^ Penny for your thoughts, Michael/' Jim, I was sure,
also observed the change, but said nothing, as if he had
observed nothing. One day he introduced me to an ac-
quaintance of his whom he called Fred, who looked like
a middle-aged man. He had wonderful deep furrows in
his face, and his hands were large and very bony and
looked as if the daily toil had rubbed off all the super-
fluous flesh and fat from them. Jim told me that Fred
was far from middle age, but barely over thirty, and that
some twelve years before he had plans and ambitions
just as big as mine, backed by at least as much brains as
he thought I had. Fred's friends expected big things
from him, said Jim, but suddenly Fred lost his heart and
married and raised a big family of children somewhere
in Jersey City. ^^ To-day," said Jim, ^^Fred is mentally
just where he was twelve years ago, and if he did not
have the contract of making the wooden packing-boxes
for this factory he would look even older than he is look-
ing now," and then he added, in his usual offhand manner
by way of illustration, that corn-stalks cease to grow as
soon as the ears of corn appear and all the sap of the corn-
stalk is served to the ears. Referring to Fred's numerous
children, Jim finished his picture by saying that Fred
looked like a withering corn-stalk with many small ears
of corn on it, and that he hoped that the withering corn-
stalk would hold out until the numerous ears of corn had
ripened. He admitted, however, that he himself was a
withering corn-stalk with no ears of corn at all; that his
life was the other extreme from Fred's, and that neither
he nor Fred had in their younger days studied and ap-
plied in practice the controlling regulators of life. Jim's
sermons on self-control always hit the mark; and when,
referring to his advice to me to control my temper, my
heart, and my speech, I suggested that according to him

84 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

life was a series of all kinds of controls difficult to man-
age, he answered that nothing is difficult when it becomes
a habit. ^^Just examine my boiler-room/' he said, ^'and
you will find that everything is controlled. The centrif-
ugal governor controls the speed of the engine; the safety-
valve limits the pressure of steam; every fire has a regu-
lator of its air draft, and every oven has a temperature
indicator. I know them all and I watch their operations
without knowing that I am doing it. Practice makes
perfect, my lad, and perfection knows no difficulties even
in a boiler-room as full of all kinds of tricks as human
life is." Jim's sermons were always short and far ahead
of anything I had ever heard in the churches in Delaware
City, or in Dayton, New Jersey, or in the Bowery Mis-
sion, or in any other church which up to that time I had
visited in this country; and, moreover, they were not
accompanied by congregational singing, which bored
me. I understood why so many blacksmiths and other
people of small learning made a great success as preachers
in this country, whereas in my native village the priest,
who prided himself upon his learning, was obliged to read
those sermons only which were sent to him by the bishop
of the diocese. I suggested to Jim in a jocular way to
quit the boiler-room and become a preacher, and he an-
swered that the boys and girls of the New England
Cracker Factory in Cortland t Street furnished a suf-
ficiently large field for his religious and educational mis-
sion. Jim's assistance helped me much to let the dream
about Jane fade away gradually and make room in my
imagination for the dreams which I first saw at Princeton
under that elm-tree in front of Nassau Hall.

The factory in Cortlandt Street was in many respects
a college in which Jim was the chaplain; and it had a
professor who should be mentioned here. It also had a
dormitory; several of the young fellows employed in the
factory lived on the top floor of the building. I was one

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHH* 85

of them, and I did not change my quarters when I was
advanced to the position of assistant to the shipping clerk.
Two great attractions kept me there. One was that the
other fellows were out every evening visiting theatres
and music-halls, so that I had the whole loft, and, in fact,
the whole factory all to myself and to a chum of mine,
who was much older than I in years but not in his position
in the factory. His name was Bilharz, and he was the
second attraction. He was the opposite to Jim and to
every human being I had ever met. He knew nothing
of nor did he care for the concrete or practical things of
life, but always lived in dreams about things which hap-
pened centuries ago. He knew Latin and Greek and all
kinds of literatures, but never made any attempts to
make any use of his knowledge. Factory work of the
humblest kind was good enough for him, and I be-
heved that he would have been satisfied to work for his
board only, if pay had been refused him. He informed
me once by an accidental slip of the tongue that he
had studied theology at the University of Freiburg, in
southern Germany, and would have become a priest
if an unfortunate love-affair had not put an end to his
ecclesiastical aspirations. He had no other aims when
he came to America, he said, than to work for a modest
living and to lead a Kfe of profound obscurity, until the
Lord called him away from this valley of tears, as he ex-
pressed it. He used a German expression and called the
earth a '^Thraenenthal.'' Although a German he spoke
Enghsh well, being a finished scholar and having hved
in America for a number of years, and having a memory
for sound which impressed me as most remarkable. He
sang like a nightingale, but only on evenings when we
were all alone. Ecclesiastical music was his favorite, and
during many an evening the strains of '' Gloria in Ex-
celsis Deo," ''Ave Maria," and ''I Know That My Re-
deemer Liveth" rang forth from the spacious lofts of the

86 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

New England Cracker Factory and lost themselves in
the silence of night among the deserted buildings of Cort-
landt Street, which were alive in daytime only. I never
tired listening to his recitations of Latin and Greek poetry,
although I did not understand it, and of selected passages
from Shakespeare and Goethe, which I did understand.
He loved the art of articulate speech and of melody, and
he thought of things only that happened three thousand
years ago when Homer sang and the Olympian gods guided
the destinies of men, but he cared for nothing else. The
steam-engine and every other kind of mechanism were to
him a deadly prose which, in his opinion, Satan had in-
vented for the purpose of leading astray the spirit of man.
''They are the weapons by which people like you are keep-
ing in slavery people Uke me," he said once, jokingly, re-
ferring to my interest in the boiler-room operations and
to my admiration of the great captains of industry whose
lives I studied and whose work I had seen and admired
at the Philadelphia exposition. I sometimes suspected
that he felt alanned by what he considered my worship
of false gods, and that this impelled him to do everything
he could for my redemption from heathenism. My ad-
miration for his learning was great, but my sympathy
for his misfortunes was even greater. His hands were
once caught in a machine and most of his fingers had
become stiff and crooked so that they looked like the
talons of a falcon. His sharp features, a crooked nose
and protruding eyes, supported this suggestion of a falcon,
but his awkward, flat-footed walk suggested a falcon
with broken wings; to say nothing of his other misfor-
tunes which made him in spirit also a falcon with broken
wings.

I felt that he knew a great deal more about the Jane
incident than he cared to disclose to me. One day
I referred to her as the Minnehaha of Cortland t Street.
''Minnehaha, laughing water,'' exclaimed Bilharz:

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 87

''where did you ever get that, you boiler-room bug?'^
and he laughed as if he had never heard a funnier thing
in his life. ''From Jim, the boiler-room hermit, to Long-
fellow, one of the greatest of American poets, is a tre-
mendous jump, a salto mortale, as they call it in a circus, '^
said Bilharz; and then, growing more serious and thought-
ful, he added something like this: ''It is really wonderful
what the eyes of a woman can do ! They are just hke the
stars in the heavens, encouraging us poor mortals to aim
at celestial heights. But many a sky-rocket seemed to
be saihng for the stars and suddenly it found itself buried
in mud. I am one of these sky-rockets," said Bilharz;
"you are not, thanks to the timely intervention of a kindly
divinity.'^ He meant Jim. Then, continuing in his usual
dramatic manner, he recited in Latin an ode of Horace,
in which the poet speaks of a youth trusting to the beam-
ing countenance of his lady-love as a mariner trusting
to the sunht ripples of a calm sea w^ho is suddenly upset
by a treacherous squall and, being rescued, gratefully
offers his wet garments in sacrifice to Neptune, the god
of the sea. After translating the ode and explaining its
meaning to me he urged me to hang my best clothes in
the boiler-room as a sacrifice to Jim, the divinity which
had rescued me from the treacherous waves of "Minne-
haha, laughing water.'' "You are the luckiest of mor-
tals, my boy,'' said Bilharz to me; "some day you will
provoke the envy of the gods and then look out for stern
Nemesis !" I did not understand the full meaning of these
classical allusions, but he assured me that some day I
should. I told Bilharz that my luck, of which he spoke
so often, was mostly due to my being so near to a man
of his learning, and that I thought he ought to be a pro-
fessor in Nassau Hall at Princeton. He declined the
honor, but offered to prepare me for it, and I accepted.
Bilharz was very moody and for days and days he had
nothing to say to anybody, not even to me ! Nobody

88 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

else cared, because nobody understood him, but I did
care. When he discovered that I sincerely admired his
learning and was interested in his puzzling personality
he became more communicative, sometimes almost hu-
man. His Enghsh accent was excellent, and I asked his
opinion about my accent and he assured me with child-
like frankness that it was rotten, but that it could be
fixed up if I submitted to a course of training prescribed
for me by my Vila on the Delaware farm. ^'I could not
be your Vila, deformed as I am," said he, referring to his
crippled fingers and to his awkward walk, ''but I will
gladly be your satyr and teach you how to imitate not
only the sounds of human language but also, if you wish
it, the melodies of birds and the chirping of bugs. The
satyrs are great in that." I knew that he could, because
many an evening while I was on the dormitory loft of
the factory reading the Mayflower Compact, the Declara-
tion of Independence, the American Constitution, Patrick
Henry's and Daniel Webster's speeches, and Lincoln's
speech at Gettysburg, Bilharz, in another part of the
building, would be imitating sounds of all kinds of birds
and bugs, after he had grown tired reciting Greek and
Latin poetry and singing ecclesiastical songs. That was
his only amusement, and he enjoyed it when he was sure
that nobody was listening; he made an exception in my
case. We finally made the start in what he called my
preparation for Nassau Hall. In the course of less than
a month I finished reciting to Bilharz the Declaration of
Independence, the American Constitution, and Lincoln's
speech at Gettysburg, submitting to many corrections
and making many efforts to give each word its proper
pronunciation, and finally he accepted my performance
as satisfactory. By that time I knew these documents
by heart and so did Bilharz, and he, in spite of himself,
liked them so well that he accused me of conspiring to
make an American out of him. ''You are sinking rapidly,

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 89

my boy, in the whirlpool of American democracy, and
you are dragging me down with you," said Bilharz one
evening, when I objected to some of the amendments
which he offered in order to harmonize the American
theory of freedom with the principles of German socialism.
He admitted that he, a loyal Roman Catholic, did not
care much for German social democracy, but that he often
wondered why the American enthusiasts for democracy
did not take German social democracy and save them-
selves the trouble of writing the Declaration of Inde-
pendence. I called his attention to the fact that American
democracy is much older than German social democracy,
and he, somewhat irritated by that suggestion and by
my defense of American democracy, as I understood it,
suggested that he should resign his position as my teacher
and become my pupil. His flippant criticism of American
democracy and my stiff defense of it helped me much to
see things which otherwise I should have missed, but
these discussions threatened the entente cordiale be-
tween Bilharz and myself. Finally we compromised and
changed our course of reading, dropping things relating
to political theories and taking up poetry. Longfellow's
and Bryant's poetry were my favorites. ^^The Village
Blacksmith" and '^Thanatopsis" I knew by heart and en-
joyed reciting to Bilharz, who was greatly pleased w^hen-
ever in these recitations I avoided making a single serious
break in my pronunciation. After reading some of Shake-
speare's dramas which Booth and other famous actors
like Lawrence Barrett and John AlcCullough were play-
ing at that time, I visited the theatre often, and from
my modest gallery seat I would analyze carefully the
articulation of every syllable which Booth and the other
actors were reciting. Booth did not have a big voice;
it was much smaller than the voice of Lawrence Barrett
or of powerful John McCullough, but I understood him
better. Bilharz explained it by saying that Booth had

90 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

a perfect articulation. ^^Articulation is an art which the
Greeks invented; big voice is brute force common among
the Russians/' he used to say, protesting whenever he
had an opportunity against mere physical strength, which
was natural considering his scanty physical resources.
He hated both the Russians and the Prussians, because,
in his opinion, they both were big brutes. In those days
the southern Germans had no love for the Prussians.
He never missed a single chance to sing the praises of
Greek drama and of the Greek theatre and of everything
which flourished during the classical age. He called my
attention to the enormous size of Greek theatres and to
the necessity of perfect articulation on the part of Greek
actors if they were to be heard. '^They were great art-
ists/' said he; ^'our actors are duffers only. We are all
duffers! Give me the Greeks, give me Homer, Pindar,
Demosthenes, Plato, Praxiteles, Phidias, Sophocles, and
hundreds of others who spoke the language of the gods
and did things which only the divine spirit in man can
do, and you can have your Morse, McCormick, Howe,
Ericsson, and the rest of the materialistic crew who ran
the show at Philadelphia." He certainly told many a
fine story when he spoke of the great poets, orators, philos-
ophers, and sculptors of Greece, and his stories impressed
me much because they were great revelations to me; they
were the first to arouse my interest in the great civiliza-
tion of Greece. They would have impressed me even more
if Bilharz had not displayed a glaring tendency to exagger-
ate, in order to create a strong contrast between what he
called the idealism of classical Greece and w^hat he called
the reaUstic materiahsm of modern America. According to
him the first had its seat among the gods on the ethereal
top of Mount Olympus and the second one was sinking
deeper and deeper through the shafts of coal and iron
mines into the dark caverns of material earth. ^'No
action," said Bilharz, ''which needs the assistance of a

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 91

steam-engine or of any other mechanism can trace its
origin to idealism nor can it end in ideahsm." I sug-
gested that every animal body is a mechanism and that
its continuous evolution seems to indicate that the world
is heading for a definite ideal. Bilharz flew up like a hornet
when he heard the word evolution.

A Hvely discussion was going on in those days between
the biological sciences and theology, Huxley and many
other scientists championing the claims of Darwin's evo-
lution theory and the theologians defending the claims
of revealed religion. I was too young and too untutored
to understand much of those learned discussions, but
Bilharz followed them with feverish anxiety. His theo-
logical arguments did not appeal to me, and so far as I
was concerned they lost even the little force they had
when Bilharz turned them against what he called Amer-
ican mechanism and materialism, which he tried to make
responsible for the alleged materialism of the evolution
theory. His political and philosophical theories based
upon blind prejudice created a gap between him and me
which widened every day. Here are some illustrations
of it.

When I described to him the election day of 1876, telling
him that I and thousands of others had stood quietly and
patiently hours and hours in drenching rain in front of
the New York Tribune building waiting for the returns
which would tell us whether Hayes or Tilden was to be
the supreme executive head of the United States during
the coming four years; how the next day some of the news-
papers had raised a howl of ''fraud," accusing the Pte-
publican party of tampering with the election returns in
one of the States, but that the people of New York City
and of the whole country had paid no attention, trusting
implicitly to the machinery of government to straighten
out crookedness if it existed, and how this dignity of
American democracy thrilled me when I compared it

92 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

with the rows and scandals accompanying elections in
the countries of the military frontier of Austria-Hungary,
he only laughed and ridiculed the whole procedure of
electing by ignorant voters the supreme executive head
of a nation. He told me a story of Aristides of Athens,
who, being requested by a voter to write upon a shell
the name of the man who was to be condemned for some
crime which was not quite clear to the Athenian voter,
wrote down his own name, and Aristides, the just, the
noblest character of Athens, was condemned. But the
condemnation of this just and noble and innocent man
was, according to Bilharz, a condemnation of the Athenian
democracy, whose shortcomings brought the downfall of
Greek civilization, and he added that the shortcomings
of American democracy would bring the downfall of the
old European civilization. The Aristides story interested
me much, but the inference he drew from it made me
think of Christian of West Street, and of his blunt re-
mark: ^'A European greenhorn must have told you that.''
Jim was present at this discussion. He was a strong Pres-
byterian and ridiculed on every occasion what he called
Bilharz's Roman Catholic views. This time he quoted
Lincoln by saying ^'that government of the people, by
the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.''
Then he added for the edification of Bilharz that religion
in the Roman Cathohc church is of the church, by the
church, for the church, and that this was the real reason
why Bilharz, trained in this kind of theology, would never
understand American democracy. This shocked me, be-
cause I expected a fist fight between my two best friends,
but . . . the fist fight did not take place.

I enjoyed taking long walks on Broadway whenever I
had free time, going up on one side and coming down on
the other, inspecting every window in bookstores and
art stores and looking at the latest things in pictorial art,
at the titles of the latest things in literature, and at the

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 93

photographs and engravings of prominent men of the
day. This gave me quite an idea of what was going on
in the American world of intellect. Bilharz never joined
me because, he said, there was nothing worth seeing on
these inspection tours of mine. Once during the noon
recess I managed to take him around the corner of Cort-
landt Street and Broadway trusting to luck to meet a
certain great person whom I had seen several times be-
fore and recognized because I saw his photograph in the
shop-windows of Broadway. I succeeded, for there in
the midst of the Broadway crowd appeared before us
William Cullen Bryant, the author of ^^Thanatopsis" !
He vv^as then the editor of The Evening Post, which was
located on Broadway not far from Cortlandt Street. I
pointed him out; Bilharz held his breath and, referring
to the wonderful appearance of the great poet, he said:
'* There is the only man in this materialistic land of reapers
and mowing-machines and chattering telephone disks who
could take a seat among the gods on Mount Olympus
and be welcomed there by the shades of the great idealists
of Greece."

At another time I managed to take him as far as City
Hall; it was some holiday, and the papers had announced
that President Hayes and his secretary of state, William
Evarts, would be at City Hall at noon, and they were
there. Bilharz and I stood in a huge crowd, but we had
a good view of the President and of his secretary of state,
and we heard every word of their short speeches. They
were dressed just like everybody else, but their remark-
able physiognomies and their scholarly words convinced
me that they belonged to the exalted position into which
the vote of the people had placed them. The New York
Sun was a bitter opponent of President Hayes and pub-
hshed his picture on the editorial page of every one of
its issues. In this picture the letters spelling '' fraud '^
were represented as branded across the expansive brow

94 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of the President. But as I looked at him standing in
front of City Hall and beheld the light which was re-
flected from his smooth and honest brow I knew that the
New York Sun was wrong, and I vowed never to read it
again until that picture disappeared from its editorial
pages. Bilharz did not understand my admiration of the
scene which we had witnessed : the democratic simplicity
of the highest officials in the great United States and the
very informal reception given to them in the great metrop-
olis, New York, was all due, according to him, to a lack
of artistic taste on the part of vulgar democracy. I
thought of the multicolored uniforms loaded with shin-
ing decorations^ of the plumed hats and long sabres, and
of the numerous glaring flags with imperial eagles dis-
played on such occasions in the Austrian Empire, and I
told Bilharz that if that monkey business was all due to
a profusion of artistic taste, then give me the simphcity
of vulgar democracy. Bilharz shrugged his shoulders and
pitied me, and I pitied him for having to pass, as he
assured me often, the rest of his days in this — to him —
the most uninteresting part of the valley of tears, das
Thraenenthal, as he called this terrestrial globe.

Such were the many differences of mental attitude
which widened the gap between Bilharz and myself. He
clung to the notions which were handed down to the Old
World from generations long departed; I, following Jim's
suggestion, was trying to pick up wherever I could new
ideas in the New World. Much learning hath made him
mad, thought I, whenever I analyzed the strange ideas
which Bilharz had of the United States of America. I
came to the conclusion that his term of apprenticeship
as greenhorn would never end. It is a national calamity
that the vast majority of our immigrants never see the
end of their apprenticeship as greenhorns.

I wished to believe that I was no longer a greenhorn,
and I certainly did not wish to listen to opinions of a

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 95

greenhorn such as were the opinions of Bilharz in matters
outside of Greek and Roman history and of the civiHza-
tion which it described. His eyes were continually turned
to a sunset the glory of which had faded long ago; my
eyes watched just as eagerly for the daily sunrise as they
did on the pasturelands of my native village, and each
sunrise showed me something new in this — to me — still
unknown land. He contemplated the past, and I explored
the present and dreamed about the future. I thought of
Jim's prophecy which said that some day I should out-
grow the opportunities of Cortlandt Street, and I felt
confident that the day had arrived. My mind was made
up to search for new opportunities, but Jim, and Bilharz
also, in spite of his shortcomings, were still a great at-
traction, and I moved slowly.

One day, after leaving Cooper Union Hbrary, I walked
along the upper Bowery, refreshing my memories of the
hard winter of 1874-1875. In Broome Street near the
Bowery I saw a store with a sign bearing the name of
Lukanitch. The man of that name must be a Serb,
thought I, and I walked in, longing to hear the language
which I had not heard for over three years. It was a
hardware store dealing principally in files and tools made
of hardened steel. Behind the desk stood an elderly man,
and he, much surprised, answered my Serbian greeting
in the Serbian language with an accent reminding me of
Kos, my Slovene teacher in Panchevo. Lukanitch told
me that he was a Slovene and that in his young days he
was a pedler, a Kranyats, as they called the Slovenian
pedlers in my native village. His annual summer tours
took him to my native Banat. A Kranyats travels on
foot hundreds of miles, carrying on his back a huge case
with numerous small drawers, each drawer containing a
different line of goods: pins, needles, and threads; pens
and pencils, cheap jewelry and gaily colored handker-
chiefs; cotton, linen, silk, and all kinds of things which

96 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the peasants are apt to buy. A Kranyats was a familiar
sight in my native village, and he was always welcome
there, because he was a Slovene, a near kin to the Serb;
and the Serb peasants of the Banat plains loved to hear
a Kranyats describe the beauties of the mountainsides of
little Slovenia on the eastern slope of the Dolomites.
When I disclosed my name to Lukanitch he asked me for
my father's name, and when I told him that it was Con-
stantine and that he Hved in Idvor, Banat, his eyes looked
hke two scintillating stars. He gave me a big hug and a
a big tear threatened to roll down his cheek when he said:
''Ko che ko Bog?'' (Who can fathom the will of God?)
After relating to me that my father had befriended him
nearly thirty years prior to that time and that he had
often stayed as guest at my father's house whenever his
annual tours as Kranyats took him through Idvor, he
begged me to come to his house on the following Sunday
and dine with his family. I did, and there I met his good
wife, a fine Slavonic type, and also his son and daughter,
who were born in this country and who looked like young
Slavs with Americanism grafted upon them. His sod
was about to graduate from a high school, and his daughter
was preparing for Normal College. They were both Amer-
ican in manner and sentiment, but father and mother,
although deeply devoted to the United States, the native
country of their children, were still sincerely attached to
the beautiful customs of the Slovene land. The children
preferred to speak EngUsh, but they deUghted in Slovene
music, which they cultivated with much enthusiasm.
That made their parents most happy. Their home was
a beautiful combination of American and Slovene civili-
zation. Once they invited me to an anniversary party
and I found the whole family dressed in most picturesque
Slovenian costumes; but everybody in the party, includ-
ing even old Lukanitch and his wife and all the Slovenian
guests, spoke EngUsh. Most of the guests were Amer-

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 97

icans, but they enjoyed the Slovenian dishes and the
Slovenian music, singing, and dancing as much as any-
body. To my great surprise the American girls, friends
of Miss Lukanitch, played Slovenian music exceedingly
well, and I thought to myself that a sufficiently frequent
repetition of parties of that kind would soon transform
the American population in the vicinity of Prince Street
into Slovenians. This interaction between two very
different civihzations gave me food for thought, which I
am still digesting mentally.

Lukanitch and his family became my devoted friends,
and they were just as interested in my plans and aspira-
tions as if I had been a member of their family. The old
lady had a tender heart, and she shed many a tear lis-
tening to bits of my history from the time when I bade
good-by to father and mother at the steamboat landing
on the Danube, five years before. The disappearance of
my roast goose at Karlovci, my first railroad ride from
Budapest to Vienna, my dialogues with the train con-
ductor and the gaudy station-master at Vienna, and my
free ride in a first-class compartment from Vienna to
Prague in company with American friends amused her and
her husband hugely. I had to repeat the story many a
time for the benefit of her Slovenian friends. She begged
me repeatedly to tell the story of my crossing of the At-
lantic and of my hardships as greenhorn, being evidently
anxious to have her children hear it. I did it several
times, scoring much success on each occasion, and as a
reward she loaded me with many Httle gifts and with
many enjoyable feasts on Sundays and hohdays. My
interpretation of the American theory of freedom, which
I had derived from reading the lives and the utterances
of the great men who made this country and from my
three years' struggles as greenhorn, found a most appre-
ciative audience in the Lukanitch family. They ap-
plauded Jim's sentiment, that this country is a monument

98 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

to the great men who made it, and not to a single family
hke the Hapsburgs of Austria-Hungary. Old Lukanitch
offered to engage me as his teacher in American history,
and young Lukanitch offered to get me an invitation
from the principal of his high school to deliver an oration
on the Declaration of Independence. The offers were
not meant very seriously, but there was enough sincerity
in them to make me believe that my training in America
was recognized as having substantial value by people
whose opinion deserved respect. I saw in it the first real
recognition referred to in the prophecy of my fellow pas-
senger on the inunigrant ship who said: ^'No matter
who you are or what you know or what you have, you
will be a greenhorn when you land in the New World,
and a greenhorn has to serve his apprenticeship as green-
horn before he can establish his claim to any recognition."
I said to myself: ''Here is my first recognition small
as it may be, and I am certainly no longer a greenhorn."
No longer a greenhorn! Oh, what a confidence that
gives to a foreign-born youth who has experienced the
hardships of serving his apprenticeship as a greenhorn!
Then there were other sources of confidence: I had a
goodly deposit in the Union Dime Savings Bank and it
was several thousand times as big as the nickel which I
brought to Castle Garden when I landed. Besides, I
had learned a thing or two in the evening classes at Cooper
Union, and my EngUsh was considered good not only in
vocabulary and grammar, but also in articulation, thanks
to Bilharz. Young Lukanitch assured me that my knowl-
edge of English, mathematics, and science would easily
take me into college. He even prophesied a most suc-
cessful college career, pointing at my big chest and broad
shoulders and feehng my hard biceps. ''You will make a
splendid college oarsman," said he, "and they will do
anything for you at Columbia if you are a good oarsman,
even if you do not get from Bilharz so very much Greek

THE END OF THE APPRENTICESHIP 99

or Latin." At that time Columbia stood very high in
rowing. One of her crews won in the Henley Regatta,
and its picture could be seen in every illustrated paper.
I had seen it many a time and remembered the looks of
every member of that famous crew. Young Lukanitch
was so enthusiastic about it that he would have gone to
Columbia himself if his father had not needed him so
much in his steel-tool business. He did his best to turn
my eyes from Nassau Hall to Columbia. He succeeded,
but not so much on account of my prospects in rowing
as on account of other things, and among them was the
official name of that institution: ^^ Columbia College in
the City of New York." The fact that the college was
located in the city of New York carried much weight,
because New York appealed to my imagination more
than any other place in the world. The impression which
it made upon my mind as the immigrant ship moved into
New York Harbor on that clear and sunny March day
when I first passed through Castle Garden, the Gate of
America, never faded. My first victory on American soil
was won in New York when I fought for my right to wear
the red fez.

IV

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP AND

COLLEGE DEGREE

The Columbia boat-race victory at Henley occurred
in 1878. By that time I had already with the assistance
of Bilharz finished a considerable portion of my Greek
and Latin preparation for Princeton — or, as I called it,
for '^Nassau Hall." My change of allegiance from Prince-
ton to Columbia was gradual.

Columbia College was located at that time on the block
between Madison and Park Avenues and between Forty-
ninth and Fiftieth Streets in New York City. One of its
proposed new buildings was, according to report, to be
called Hamilton Hall, in honor of Alexander Hamilton.
When I learned this I looked up the history of Alexander
Hamilton. One can imagine how thrilled I was when I
found that Hamilton left the junior class at Columbia
College and joined Washington's armies as captain when
he was barely nineteen, and at twenty was heutenant-
colonel and Washington's aide-de-camp! What an ap-
peal to a young imagination! Few things ever thrilled
me as much as the life of Alexander Hamilton. Every
American youth preparing for college should read the
history of Hamilton's life.

One cannot look up the history of Hamilton's life with-
out running across the name of another great Columbia
man, John Jay, first Secretary of Foreign Affairs, ap-
pointed by Congress, and the first Chief Justice of the
United States, appointed by Washington, and a stanch
backer of briUiant Hamilton. Chancellor Livingston,

100

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 101

another great Columbia man, administered the first con-
stitutional oath of office to Washington; he also com-
pleted the purchase of Louisiana from France. The more
I studied the history of Hamilton's time the more I saw
what tremendous influence Columbia's alumni exerted at
that time. Cortlandt Street being near Trinity Church,
I walked there to look at the Hamilton monument in the
Trinity churchyard. This monument was the first sug-
gestion to me of a bond of union between Trinity Church
and Columbia College. Before long I found many other
bonds of union between these two great institutions.

Every time I passed Columbia College in my long walks
up-to\^Ti and looked at the rising structure of Hamilton
Hall, I thought oi these three great Columbia men. What
student of Hamilton's life could have looked at Hamilton
Hall on Madison Avenue without being reminded of the
magnificent intellectual efforts which two young patriots,
Hamilton and Madison, made in the defense of the fed-
eralist form of the new American RepubUc ? It happened
thus that m.y memory of Nassau Hall at Princeton grad-
ually faded, although it never vanished. The famous
boat-race victory of a Columbia crew' at Henley would
not alone have produced this effect. It was produced by
three great New York men of the Revolutionary period
who were alumni of ^^ Columbia College in the City of
New York." Columbia had at that time a school of mines
and engineering, separate from the college. I was much
better prepared for it than for Columbia College, thanks
to the evening lectures at Cooper Union, and to my natural
inclination to scientific studies, but I imagined that the
spirit of Hamilton, Jay, and Livingston hovered about
the academic buildings of Columbia College only.

Bilharz rejoiced when I informed him of my decision
to put on extra pressure in my classical studies prepara-
tory for Columbia College, and congratulated himself, as
I found out later, that he had succeeded in rescuing me

102 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

from the worship of what he called scientific materialism.
The good old fellow did not know that at that very time
I was spending many hours of my spare time reading
Tyndall's ''Heat as a Mode of Motion," and Tyndall's
famous lectures on Sound and Light, which he dehvered
in this country with great success in the early seventies.
These popular descriptions of physical phenomena were
the poems in prose to which I referred before. Another
book of a similar character came into my hands at that
time through the Cooper Union Ubrary. I have a copy
of it now, having received it over thirty years ago as a
present from the late General Thomas Ewing. It is called
''The Poetry of Science,'' published in 1848 by Robert
Hunt. It starts with the following quotation from Mil-
ton:

"How charming is Divine Philosophy!

Not harsh and crabbed as dull fools suppose,

But musical as is Apollo's lute

And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets,

Where no crude surfeit reigns."

Tyndall's and Hunt's writings appealed to my imagina-
tion at that time in the same way as Milton's "Paradise
Lost," or as Longfellow's "Hiawatha," or as William
CuUen Bryant's "Thanatopsis." They convinced me
that the Slavs were not the only people who, as I had
been inchned to think, see the poetical side of science,
but that everybody sees it, because science on its ab-
stract side is poetry; it is Divine Philosophy, as Milton
calls it. Science is a food which nourishes not only the
material but also the spiritual body of man. This was
my pet argument whenever I was called upon to defend
science against Bilharz's attacks.

My progress in Greek and Latin grammar under the
guidance of Bilharz was rapid even before I had decided
to steer for Columbia. It was a question of memory and
of analysis. My memory had had a stiff Hnguistic train-

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 103

ing during the several years preceding that date, in try-
ing to master the English language with all its vagaries
in speUing and pronunciation. These vagaries I did not
find in the grammars of the classical languages, which
appeared to me to be as definite and as exact as the geo-
metrical theorems in Euclid. Hadley's Greek Grammar
did not differ much, I thought, from Davies' Legendre's
Geometry. Mathematics was always my strong point,
and good memory is a characteristic virtue of the Serb
race; I, therefore, had an easy road in my classical studies
with Bilharz.

As the time went on I saw that entrance into Colum-
bia College w^as within easy reach so far as my studies
were concerned. But here again the old question arose
which I first asked myself three years before, when the
train, taking me from Nassau Hall to the Bowery, was ap-
proaching New York. '^Social unpreparedness^' stared
me in the face. I could not define it, but I felt its exist-
ence. I shall try to describe it. Columbia College, a
daughter of great Trinity Church, an alma mater of men
like Hamilton, Jay, Livingston, and of many other gentle-
men and scholars who guided the destiny of these great
United States — can that great American institution, I
asked myself, afford to enroll a raw Serbian immigrant
among its students; train me, an uncouth employee of a
cracker factory, to become one of its alumni? I thought
of the first sentence in the Declaration of Independence,
but it did not persuade me that I w^as an equal of the
American boy who was prepared to meet all the require-
ments necessary for entrance into Columbia College, be-
cause I was convinced that in addition to entrance ex-
aminations there were other requirements for which no
prescribed examinations existed. The college of Hamil-
ton and of Jay expected certain other things which I
knew I did not have and could not get from books. A
jump from the Cortlandt Street factory to Columbia

104 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

College, from Jim and Bilharz to patriarchal President
Barnard and the famous professors at Columbia, ap-
peared to me like a jump over Columbia's great and ven-
erable traditions. Old Lukanitch and his family and
their American friends helped me much to start build-
ing a bridge over this big gap, but the more I associated
with these people, who Hved around himible Prince Street,
not far from the Bowery, the more I saw my shortcomings
in what I called, for want of a better name, '^social pre-
paredness." ^'How shall I feel,'' I asked myself, ^'when
I begin to associate with boys whose parents live on Madi-
son and Fifth Avenues, and whose ancestors were friends
of Hamilton and of Jay?" Their traditions, I was sure,
gave them an equipment which I did not have, unless
my Serbian traditions proved to be similar to their Amer-
ican traditions. My native village attached great im-
portance to traditions, and I knew how much the peas-
ants of Idvor would resent it if a stranger not in tune
with their traditions attempted to settle in their historic
village.

The examination of immigrants which I saw at Castle
Garden, when I landed, had made me think that tradi-
tions did not count for much in Castle Garden. But
my principal acquisition from my apprenticeship as green-
horn had been the recognition that there are great Amer-
ican traditions, and that the opportunities of this coun-
try are inaccessible to immigrants who, like Bilharz, do
not understand their meaning and their vital importance
in American Ufe. Vila's mother on the Delaware farm,
my experiences with Christian of West Street, and Jim's
little sermons in the Cortlandt Street boiler-room had
impressed this idea upon my mind very strongly. The
mental attitude of a young Serb from the military fron-
tier was naturally very receptive to impressions of that
kind. My respect for the traditions of my own race had
prepared me to respect the traditions of the country which

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 105

I expected to adopt, and hence I was afraid that my cul-
tural equipment was not up to the standards of the col-
lege boys who were brought up in accordance with Amer-
ican traditions. My subsequent experience showed me
that my anxiety was justifiable.

I have already mentioned that a short time before I
ran away from Prague and headed for the United States
I had read a translation of Harriet Beecher Stowe's
'^ Uncle Tom's Cabin.'' It had been recommended to
me by my American friends who gave me a free ride in
a first-class compartment from Vienna to Prague. My
mention of the name of this great woman, together with
the names of Lincoln and of Franklin, as Americans that
I knew something about, had won me the sympathy of
the immigration officials at Castle Garden, who, other-
wise, might have deported me. Her name was deeply
engraved upon the tablets of my memory. The famous
Beecher-Tilton trial was much discussed in those days
in the New York press, and when I heard that Henry
Ward Beecher was a brother of the author of ^^ Uncle
Tom's Cabin" my opinion of Tilton was formed, and no
judge or jury could have changed it. Beecher's photo-
graphs, which I saw in my inspection tours on Broadway,
confirmed me in my behef that he was a brother worthy
of his great sister. Young Lukanitch and his sister knew
of Beecher's fame and, although strict Roman Catholics,
they consented to accompany me on my first pilgrimage
to Beecher's Plymouth Church, and there I saw the great
orator for the first time.

His face looked to me like that of a Hon and his long
gray locks, reaching almost to his shoulders, supported
this illusion. The church provided a setting worthy of
his striking appearance. The grand organ behind and
above the pulpit supplied a harmonious musical back-
ground to the magnificent singing of the large choir. I
felt that the thrilUng music was tuning me up for the

106 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

sermon which the great orator was about to preach, and
I was right. The sermon was free from involved theo-
logical analysis; it dealt with simple questions of human
life and its determination by human habits. It was a
dramatic and poetic presentation of the little sermons
which Jim preached in the Cortlandt Street boiler-room,
but in a very plain form of statement. The fact, how-
ever, that I found many spiritual bonds between great
Plymouth Church and Jim's humble boiler-room shows
me to-day why Beecher touched the heart-strings of the
plain people. He helped them to solve some of their
problems of life just as Jim tried to help me solve mine.
But Jim was not a cultured man and he delivered his
chunks of practical wisdom in the same offhand manner
in which he fed shovelfuls of coal to the busy fires under
his boilers. Beecher, on the other hand, was a great orator
and a great poet, and every httle grain of wisdom stored
up in human hfe was placed before his congregation with
all the force of his overpowering personality and with all
the embelUshments with which the imagination of a poet-
ical nature could clothe it. I felt thrills creeping over my
whole body as I listened, and the effect was not only men-
tal and spiritual, but also physical, undoubtedly because
of the quickening of the blood's circulation produced by
the mental exhilaration. Bilharz, although a rigid Roman
Cathohc, admitted, after hearing Beecher several times,
that great sermons are possible even without any theologi-
cal flavoring. ^^But," said he in his usual dramatic way,
''everything is possible to a poetic soul which is propelled
by the wings of a genius." A remarkable concession from
a man of Bilharz 's training and mental attitude !

Jim, who was a strict Presbyterian, rejoiced that I had
picked out a Congregational Church for rehgious worship,
and old Lukanitch confessed that if I persuaded his chil-
dren to go with me to Plymouth Church very often they
might desert the Roman Catholic faith of their ancestors.

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 107

I felt assured, however, that St. Sava and the Orthodoxy
of my mother would never lose me through the influence
of Beecher's genius, because Beecher was preaching to
all humanity and not to a particular creed. His words
were hke the life-giving radiation of the sun, which shines
upon all things alike. I saw in him a hving example of
that type of American who, like Hamilton, Jay, Living-
ston, and the other great men of whom I had heard at
the Philadelphia exposition, were the spiritual and the
intellectual giants of the Revolutionary period. My
study of the history of Hamilton's life had shown me that
the number of these giants was large; many of them signed
the Declaration of Independence. I did not fail to see
in this a most propitious omen of a great future for the
country. What a spiritual giant Lincoln must have been,
I thought, when I heard Beecher refer to him with hum-
blest veneration! Beecher was the sunrise which dis-
pelled much of that mist which prevented my eyes, just
as it prevents all foreign eyes, from seeing the clear out-
hne of American civilization.

Four years previously I had for the first time attended
an American church service in Delaware City, and had
carried away the impression that in matters of pubhc
worship America was not up to the standards prescribed
by the Serbian Church. Beecher and his Plymouth
Church changed my judgment completely. Beecher's
congregation seemed to me like a beehive full of honey-
hearted beings. Each of them reminded me of the Amer-
icans who had befriended me at the railroad-station in
Vienna, and had rescued me from the official dragon who
threatened to send me back to the prisons of the mihtary
frontier. I firmly believed that Beecher was preaching
a new gospel, the American gospel of humanity, the same
gospel which his great sister had preached. Every mem-
ber of his congregation looked to me like a faithful dis-
ciple of this doctrine.

108 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

One of those honey-hearted disciples was a Doctor
Charles Shepard, of Columbia Heights, Brooklyn. He
and his family were Unitarians, I think, but they often
attended Plymouth Church on account of their great
admiration for Beecher. Doctor Shepard's family was,
in my opinion, a family of saints; generosity, refinement,
and spiritual discipHne filled the golden atmosphere of
their home. When I disclosed my plans to the good doc-
tor, he offered to help me carry them out. He was an
ardent advocate of the curative powers of hydropathy
in conjunction with proper diet and total abstinence from
alcohol and tobacco. '^CleanUness is next to godliness^'
was his motto, and by cleanliness he meant freedom from
unclean habits of every kind. His theory was successfully
practised in his hydropathic estabUshment, and he flour-
ished, and his institution was famous. His very old father,
over eighty years of age, who managed the office of the
establishment, needed assistance, and Doctor Shepard
offered me the position and spoke of getting a friend of
his to help me prepare for entrance to Columbia. His
friend was Professor Webster, who taught Greek and
Latin at the Adelphi Academy in Brooklyn. I jumped
at Doctor Shepard's offer, although the prospect of de-
serting Jim and Bilharz made me hesitate. But Jim
applauded my decision and he recalled his prophecy that
I should soon outgrow the opportunities of the New Eng-
land Cracker Factory. Bilharz expressed his gratification
that he had contributed to my progress, and he certainly
had, both by what he praised and by what he condemned.
He was sincere in both, but his praise was founded upon
a rare knowledge of classical Uteratures, while his con-
demnation was due to prejudice against science and
against American democracy. The real secret of his
grip upon my imagination I shall disclose later.

Professor Webster was an ideal pedagogue; his pupils
were boys and girls from some of the best families of

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 109

Brooklyn. Their teacher was to them an apostle of
classical culture, in which they were much interested,
partly because of their admiration for their beloved
teacher. After a few private lessons he invited me to
join his classes in Greek and Latin, where I was received
with many signs of cordiality from both the boys and
the girls. Like myself, they were preparing for college.
I attended these classes three times a week and enter-
tained them much by my continental pronunciation of
Greek and Latin, which I had learned from Bilharz, who
had also taught me to recite the Greek and Latin hexam-
eter with proper intonation. This delighted the heart
of Professor Webster and of his pupils. Recitations of
Greek and Latin verses with faultless rhythm were all
which at first I could offer to the entertainment of my
classmates. After a while I entertained some of them
with Serbian poetry and also with Serbian kolo dancing.
I made every effort to make them forget that I was a
Balkan barbarian; but everybody, as if reading my
thoughts, assured me that I was contributing more to
the Adelphi Academy than I was getting in return. I
knew better. I felt that the association with those splen-
did boys and girls and with Professor Webster contrib-
uted much more to my preparation for Columbia than
all the book work which I had ever done anywhere.

Doctor Shepard and his family saw the rapid change
in me, I thought, and many of their evidences of approval
were very encouraging. When I first met Doctor Shepard
he was strongly pro-Turkish whenever the Balkan war,
which was raging at that time, was discussed. He had a
notion that the Serbians were a rebellious and barbarous
race. During the early part of 1879 he gradually shifted
to the Serbian side, and I was bold enough to take all
credit for it to myself. I considered his and his family's
approval the best test of the success of my efforts to under-
stand the American standards of conduct. This success

no FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

meant much more to me in my preparation for college
than the success in my studies.

In an interscholastic athletic contest I volunteered to
run in a ten-mile race without any previous training,
and won. From thai day on my friends at the Adelphi
Academy regarded me as one of their number, and it was
a hberal education to me to hsten to their eulogies of
my loyalty to them and to their institution, which, they
said, I displayed when I fought under the Adelphi banner
on the athletic field. Legends began to grow up among
the Adelphi boys and girls about a Serbian youngster
who had won the ten-mile race without previous train-
ing. When your young and enthusiastic friends begin
to indulge in legends about you, be assured that you are
getting on some. But legends, like nursery rhymes, will
lull you to sleep if you are not very, very wide-awake.
This experience made me see clearly what young Lu-
kanitch had meant when he told me what oarsmanship
might do for me at Columbia even if I did not know much
Greek and Latin. I was confirmed in this when the boys
of the Adelphi Academy who expected to enter Yale or
Princeton used much of their persuasive powers to steer
me to these colleges. It encouraged me much and dimin-
ished greatly my anxiety about '^ social unpreparedness."
But my answer was that the college of Hamilton, Jay,
and Livingston, in the City of New York, was the port
for which I was sailing, and that Beecher's church in
Brooklyn would be one of the anchors to keep me there,
and that Beecher, as far as I was concerned, would be a
part of Columbia College.

The siumner vacation of 1879 was approaching, and I
knew that all my academic friends in New York and
Brooklyn would leave for the country. There was noth-
ing to keep me in Brooklyn except my obligations to good
Doctor Shepard. He excused me when I told him that
I wished to devote all my time during that summer to
study, so as to insure my passing with a high mark all

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 111

my entrance examinations in the following autumn. A
high mark would gain me freedom from all tuition fees
at Columbia, a very serious consideration. Doctor Shep-
ard approved, and I moved to what I called, jokingly,
my summer ^' villa'' on the Passaic River, near Ruther-
ford Park, New Jersey. It was a tiny little cottage near
the bank of the river; it had not been occupied for a long
time, and it was looked after by an old Danish woman
who lived quite near it. She kept two cows and a lot of
chickens and ducks and sold butter and eggs and fowl.
Her son Christopher peddled kindling-wood in Passaic,
Belleville, and Newark, New Jersey. The old lady con-
sented to let me live in the cottage until a permanent
tenant should appear, and she w^as willing to take care
of me for a certain payment per week. I accepted her
terms on condition that she allow me to work off a cer-
tain part of the agreed amount by sawing kindling-wood
from ten to twelve in the morning and from four to six
in the afternoon. My suggestion made her thoughtful,
and she finally confessed her fear that my exercises before
meals might give me such an appetite that I should eat
her out of house and home. We agreed to try the scheme
for a week, and we were both satisfied with the result.
She took good care of me, and I furnished her with more
kindhng-wood for her son's trade than she had ever ex-
pected. Moreover, the regular help, who was hired for
the specific purpose of cutting kindling-wood, increased
his output, in order to keep up with me. I enjoyed the
work hugely as means of splendid exercise, and rejoiced
in making the output as large as possible. The old lady
was delighted with the unexpected result. Every two-
hour period of sawing and sphtting of kindling-wood
was followed by a dip and swim in the Passaic River,
and by the end of the sunmier I was all muscle and could
have run a race of twenty miles without any previous
training. This proved a very valuable asset in the be-

112 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ginning of my college career; muscle and brawn are splen-
did things to take along when one enters college, and
have while in college. Several incidents in my college
career bear upon the interesting feature of athletics in
American college Hfe, and I shall describe them later
even at the risk of appearing egotistical. This feature is
characteristically American and is quite unknown on the
continent of Europe.

Eight hours each day I devoted to study: three in the
morning to Greek, three in the afternoon to Latin, and
two in the evening to other studies. It was a most profit-
able sunmier outing of over three months, and it cost me
only thirty dollars; the rest was paid in sawing and split-
ting of kindling-wood. Whenever I read now about the
Kaiser's activities at Doom, I think of my smnmer ac-
tivities in 1879, and I wonder who in the world suggested
my scheme to WilHam Hohenzollern !

During the last week of September of that year I pre-
sented myself at Columbia for entrance examinations.
They were oral, and were conducted by the professors
themselves and not by junior instructors. The first two
books of the Iliad, excepting the catalogue of ships, and
four orations of Cicero, I knew by heart. My leisure
time at my Passaic River ^' villa" had permitted me these
pleasant mental gymnastics; I wanted to show off before
Bilharz with my Greek and Latin quotations; to say
nothing of the wonderful mental exhilaration which a
young student gets from reading aloud and memorizing
the words of Homer and of Cicero. The professors were
greatly surprised and asked me why I had taken so much
trouble. I told them that it was no trouble, because
Serbs dehght in memorizing beautiful lines. The Serbs
of Montenegro, for instance, know by heart most of the
lines which their great poet Nyegosh ever wrote, and
particularly his great epic ''The Mountain Glory." I
told them also of ilhterate Baba Batikin, the minstrel of

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 113

my native village, who knew most of the old Serbian
ballads by heart. Besides, I assured the professors, I
wanted to do in Greek and Latin as well as I possibly
could, so as to gain free tuition. For the other studies I
was not afraid, I told them, and they assured me that
my chances for free tuition were certainly good. The
other examinations gave me no trouble, thanks to my
training with Bilharz and with the lecturers in the evening
classes at Cooper Union. A note from the Registrar's
office informed me a few days later that I was enrolled
as a student in Columbia College with freedom from all
tuition fees. There was no person in the United States
on that glorious day happier than I !

The college atmosphere which I found at Columbia
at that time gave me a new sensation. I did not under-
stand it at first and misinterpreted many things. The
few days preceding the opening of the college sessions I
spent chasing around for a boarding-house, while my
classmates were hanging around the college buildings,
making arrangements to join this or that fraternity, and
also BoUdifying the line of defense of the freshmen against
the hostile sophomores. There was a Hvely process of
organization going on under the leadership of groups of
boys who came from the same preparatory schools. These
groups led and the others were expected to follow without
a murmur. Insubordination or even indifference was
condemned as lack of college spirit. This spirit was neces-
sary among the freshmen particularly, because, as I was
informed later, there was a great common danger — the
sophomores ! I saw some of this feverish activity going
on, but did not understand its meaning and hence re-
mained outside of it, as if I were a stranger and not a
member of the freshman class, which I heard described,
by the freshmen themselves, as the best freshman class
in the history of Columbia. The sophomores denied this
in a most provoking manner; hence the hostihty. No-

114 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

body paid any attention to me; nobody knew me, because
I did not come from any of the preparatory schools which
prepared boys for Colmnbia. One day I saw on the cam-
pus two huge waves of Hvely youngsters beating against
each other just Uke inrolHng waves of the sea hfting on
their backs the returning waves which had been reflected
from the chffs of the shore. The freshmen were defend-
ing a cane against fierce attacks of the sophomores. It
was the historic Columbia cane rush, I was told by
Michael, the college janitor, who stood alongside of me
as I looked on. It was not a real fight resulting in broken
noses or blackened eyes, but just a most vigorous push-
and-puU contest, the sophomores trying to take posses-
sion of a cane which a strong freshman, surrounded by a
stalwart body-guard of freshmen, was holding and guard-
ing just as a guard of fanatic monks would defend the
sacred rehcs of a great saint. This freshmen group was
the centre of the scrimmage and it stood there like a high
rock in the midst of an angry sea. Coats and shirts were
torn off the backs of the brave fighters, some attacking
and others defending the central group, but not a single
ugly swear-word was heard nor did I see a single sign of
intentional bloodshed. Members of the junior and senior
classes watched as umpires. Michael, the janitor, who
knew everybody on the college campus as a shepherd
knows his sheep, was not quite certain about my identity.
He asked me whether I was a freshman, and when I said
^^yes," he asked me why in the world I was not in the
rush, defending the freshmen body-guard. He looked so
anxious and worried that I felt sure of being guilty of
some serious offense against old Colimabia traditions. I
immediately took off my coat and stiff shirt and plunged
into the surging waves of sophomores and freshmen and
had almost reached the central body-guard of freshmen,
eager to join in its defense, when a sophomore, named
Frank Henry, grabbed me and pulled me back, telling

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 115

me that I had no business to cross the line of umpires at
that late moment. I did not know the rules of the game
and shoved him aside and we clinched. He was the
strongest man in Columbia College, as I learned later,
but my kindling-wood operations on the banks of the
Passaic River had made me a stiff opponent. We wrestled
and wrestled and would have wrestled till sunset like Prince
Marco and the Arab Moussa Kessedjia in the old Serbian
ballads, if the umpires had not proclaimed the cane rush
a draw. The main show being over, the side show which
Henry and I were keeping up had no further useful pur-
pose to serve, and we stopped and shook hands. He
was glad to stop, he admitted, and so was I, but he told
my classmates that ^'ii that terrible Turk had been se-
lected a member of the freshmen body-guard the result
of the cane rush might have been different." I told him
that I was a Serb, and not a Turk, and he apologized,
saying that he could never draw very fine distinctions
between the various races in the Balkans. ''But, what-
ever race you are," said he, ''you will be a good fellow
if you will learn to play the game J ^ Splendid advice
from a college boy! "Play the game,^' what a wonder-
ful phrase! I studied it long, and the more I thought
about it the more I was convinced that one aspect of
the history of this country with all its traditions is
summed up in these three words. No foreigner can under-
stand this country who does not know the full meaning
of this phrase, which I first heard from a Columbia
College youngster. No foreign language can so translate
the phrase as to reproduce its brevity and at the same
time convey its full meaning. But, when I heard it, I
thought of the bootblacks and newsboys who, five years
previously, had acted as umpires when I defended my
right to wear a red fez. To "play the game" according
to the best traditions of the land which offered me all of
its opportunities was always my idea of /\jiiericaniza-

116 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

tion. But how many immigrants to this land can be
made to understand this?

Some little time after this incident I was approached
by the captain of the freshman crew, who asked me to
join his crew. I remembered young Lukanitch^s opinion
about oarsmanship at Columbia, and I was sorely tempted.
But, unfortunately, I had only three hundred and eleven
dollars when I started my college career, and I knew that
if I was to retain my free tuition by high standing in
scholarship and also earn further money for my living
expenses I should have no time for other activities.
^' Study, work for a living, no participation in college
activities outside of the recitation-room! Do you call
that college training?'^ asked the captain of the fresh-
man crew, looking perfectly surprised at my story, which,
being the son of wealthy parents, he did not understand.
I admitted that it was not, in the full sense of the word,
but that I was not in a position to avail myself of all the
opportunities which Columbia offered me, and that, in
fact, I had already obtained a great deal more than an
immigrant could reasonably have expected. I touched
his sympathetic chord, and I felt that I had made a new
friend. The result of this interview was that my class-
mates refrained from asking me to join any of the college
activities for fear that my inability to comply with their
request might make me feel badly. I had their sym-
pathy, but I missed their fellowship, and therefore I missed
in my freshman year much of that splendid training out-
side of the classroom which an American college offers
to its students.

At the end of the freshman year I gained two prizes
of one hundred dollars each, one in Greek and the other
in mathematics. They were won in stiff competitive
examinations and meant a considerable scholastic success,
but, nevertheless, they excited little interest among my
classmatee. Results of examinations were considered a

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 117

personal matter of the individual student himself and
not of his fellow classmen. The prizes weie practically
the only money upon which I could rely to help carry
me through my second year. The estimated budget for
that year, however, was not fully provided for, and I
looked for a job for the long summer vacation. I did not
want a job in the city. IMy kindling-wood activity of
the preceding sunmier suited me better, and after some
consultation with my friend Christopher, the kindhng-
wood peddler of Rutherford Park, I decided to accept a
job on a contract of his to mow hay during that summer
in the various sections of the Hackensack lowlands. No
Columbia athlete ever had a better opportunity to de-
velop his back and biceps than I had during that sunamer.
I made good use of it, and earned seventy-five dollars net.
When my sophomore year began I awaited the cane
rush which, according to old Columbia custom, took
place between the sophomores and the freshmen at the
beginning of each academic year, and I was prepared for
it; I knew also what it meant to ^^play the game.'^ This
time my class had to do the attacking and I helped with
a vengeance. The muscles which had been hardened in
the Hackensack meadows proved most effective and the
result was that shortly I had the freshmen's cane on the
ground, and was lying flat over it, covering it with my chest.
The pressure of a score of freshmen and sophomores piled
up on top of me threatened to squeeze the cane through
my chest bone, which already, I imagined, was pressing
against mxy lungs, my difficult breathing leading me
to think that my last hour had come. Fortunately, the
mnpires cleared away the lively heap of struggling boys
on top of me, and I breathed freely again. Some fresh-
men were found stretched alongside of me with their
hands holding on to the stick. Aii equal number of sopho-
mores held on, and, consequently^, the imipires declai'ed
the rush a draw. Nobody was anxious to have another

118 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

rush, and it was proposed by the freshmen to settle the
question of class superiority by a wrestling-match, two best
out of three falls, catch as catch can. They had a big
fellow who had some fame as a wrestler of great strength,
and they issued a defiant challenge to the sophomores.
My classmates held a meeting in order to pick a match
for the freshman giant, but nobody seemed to be quite
up to the job. Finally I volunteered, declaring that I
was not afraid to tackle the freshman giant. ^'Do you
expect to down him with Greek verses and mathematical
formulse?" shouted some of my classmates, who had
grave doubts about the muscle and the wrestling ability
of a fellow who had won Greek and mathematical prizes.
They knew nothing about my strenuous mowing in the
Hackensack meadows during three long months of that
summer. The captain of the class crew approached me,
felt my biceps, my chest, and my back, and shouted,
''All right!" The wrestling-match came off, and the
freshman giant had no show with a boy who had learned
the art of wrestling on the pasture-lands of Idvor, and
had held his own against experienced mowers in the
Hackensack meadows. The victory was quick and com-
plete, and my classmates carried me in triumph to Fritz's
saloon, not far from the college, where many a toast was
druiik to ''Michael the Serbian.'' From that day on
my classmates called me by my first name and took me
up as if I had been a distinguished descendant of Alex-
ander Hamilton himself. My scholastic victory in Greek
and mathematics meant nothing to my classmates, be-
cause it was a purely personal matter, but my athletic
victory meant everything, because it was a victory of
my whole class. Had I won my scholastic victory in
competition with a representative from another college,
then the matter would have had an entirely different
aspect. Esprit de corps is one of those splendid things
which American college Ufe cultivates, and I had the

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 119

good fortune to reap many benefits from it. He who
pays no attention to this esprit de corps in an American
college runs the risk of being dubbed a ^'greasy grind.''

The sophomore year opened auspiciously. Eight of
my classmates formed a class, the Octagon, and invited
me to coach them in Greek and in mathematics, twice a
week. The captain of the class crew was a member of it.
I suspected that he remembered my reasons for refusing
to join the freshman crew and wanted to help. The Oc-
tagon class was a great help in more ways than one. I
gave instruction in wrestling also to several classmates,
in exchange for instruction in boxing. This was my phys-
ical exercise, and it was a strenuous one. Devereux Em-
met, a descendant of the great Irish patriot, was one of
these exchange instructors; he could stand any amount
of punishment in our boxing bouts, which impressed upon
my mind the truth of the saying that ^' blood will tell."
Before the sophomore year was over my classmates ac-
knowledged me not only a champion in Greek and in
mathematics, but also a champion in wrestling and box-
ing. The combination was somewhat unusual and legends
began to be spun about it, but they did not turn my head,
nor lull me to sleep, not even when they led to my election
as class president for the junior year. This was indeed
a great compliment, for, because of the junior promenade,
the dance given annually by the junior class, it was cus-
tomary to elect for that year a class president who was
socially very prominent. A distinguished classmate, a
descendant of three great American names, and a shining
light in New York's younger social set, was my chief
opponent and I begged to withdraw in his favor; a de-
scendant of Hamilton inspired awe. But my opponent
would not listen to it. He was a member of the most
select fraternity and not at all unpopular, but many of
my classmates objected to him, although he was the grand-
son of a still Uving former Secretary of State and chair-

1 20 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

man of the board of trustees of Columbia College. They
thought that he paid too much attention to the fashion-
plates of London, and dressed too fashionably. There
were other Columbia boys at that time who, I thought,
dressed just as fashionably, and yet they were very popu-
lar; but they were fine athletes, whereas my opponent
was believed to rely too much upon the history of his long
name and upon his splendid appearance. He certainly
was a fine exam^ple of classical repose; his classmates,
however, admired action. He was like a young Alcibiades
in breeding, looks, and pose, but not in action.

Some of the old American colleges have been accused
from time to time of encouraging snobbery and a spirit
of aristocracy which is not in harmony with American
ideas of democracy. My personal experience as student
at Columbia gives competency to my opinion upon that
subject. Snobs will be found in every country and clime,
but there were fewer snobs at Columbia in those days
than in many other much less exalted places, although
Columbia at that time was accused of being a nest of
dudes and snobs. This was one of the arguments ad-
vanced by those friends of mine at the Adelphi Academy
who tried to persuade me to go to Princeton or Yale.
The spirit of aristocracy was there, but it was an aris-
tocracy of the same kind as existed in my native peasant
village. It was a spirit of unconscious reverence for the
best American traditions. I say '' unconscious,'^ and by
that I mean absence of noisy chauvinism and of that
racial intolerance by which the Teutonism of Austria
and the IMagyarism of Hungary had driven me away
from Prague and from Panchevo. A name with a fine
American tradition back of it attracted much attention,
but it was only a letter of recommendation. He who
was found wanting in his make-up and in his conduct
when weighed by the best Columbia College traditions
— and they were a part of American traditions — had a

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 121

lonely time during his college career, in spite of his illus-
trious name or his family's great wealth. Foreign-born
students, like Cubans and South Americans, met with a
respectful indifference so long as they remained foreigners.
Needless to say, many of them adopted rapidly the at-
tractive ways of the Columbia boys. But nobody would
have resented it, or even paid any attention to it, if they
had retained their foreign ways. A hopeless fellow be-
came a member of that very small class of students known
at that time as ^'muckers." They complained bitterly of
snobbery and of aristocracy. I do not believe that either
the spirit of plutocracy, or of socialism and communism,
or of any other un-American current of thought could
ever start from an American college hke Columbia of
those days, and bore its way into American life. That
type of aristocracy which made the American college
immune from contagion by un-American influence existed ;
it was very exacting, and it was much encouraged. But
when American college boys, accused of bowing to the
spirit of aristocracy, have among them a Hamilton, a
Livingston, a DeWitt, and several descendants of Jay,
and yet elect for class president the penniless son of a
Serbian peasant village, because they admire his mental
and physical efforts to learn and to comply with Colum-
bia's traditions, one can rest assured that the spirit of
American democracy was very much alive in those col-
lege boys.

My success with the Octagon class established my
reputation as a doctor for '4ame ducks." This was the
name of those students who failed in their college exami-
nations, usually examinations in Greek, Latin, and mathe-
matics. Lame ducks needed a special treatment, called
coaching. I became quite an expert in it, and presently
I saw a flock of lame ducks gathering around me, offering
liberal rewards for a speedy cure. My sunmier vacations
no longer called me to the Passaic River to cut kindling-

122 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

wood, nor to the Hackensack meadows to strain my back
to the utmost trjdng to keep up with experienced mowers.
Coaching lame ducks was incomparably more remunera-
tive and also left me with plenty of leisure time for tennis,
horseback riding, or swimming and diving contests. Dur-
ing the college sessions I usually had in charge several
bad cases of academic lameness, cases that could not be
cured during the summer vacations, but had to be care-
fully nursed throughout the whole academic year. Finan-
cially I fared better than most of my young professors,
and I saved, looking ahead for the realization of a pet
dream of mine. My coaching experience was remunera-
tive not only from the material but also from the cultural
side; it brought me in touch with some of the best ex-
ponents of New York's social life, where I found a hearty
welcome, a friendly sympathy, and many lessons which
I considered as among the most valuable acquisitions in my
college life. One of them deserves special mention here.
Lewis Morris Rutherfurd, a trustee of Columbia Col-
lege, was at that time the head of the famous Rutherfurd
family. He was a gentleman of leisure and devoted him-
seK to science and particularly to photographic astrono-
my, just as did his famous friend. Doctor John William
Draper, the author of the '^ History of the Intellectual
Development of Europe." Rutherfurd was a pioneer
worker in this field of astronomy, and his photographs of
the moon and of the stars were always regarded by the
scientists of the world as most valuable contributions to
astronomy. The historic Rutherfurd mansion, with its
astronomical observatory, was on Eleventh Street and
Second Avenue. Rutherfurd' s sons, Lewis and Winthrop,
were my fellow students at Columbia; Lewis was a year
ahead of me and Winthrop was a year below me. Through
their cousin, a chum and classmate of mine, I became ac-
quainted with them. No handsomer boys ever sat in
Hamilton Hall: tall, athletic, and graceful, just like two

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 123

splendid products of the physical culture of classical
Greece. One of them held the American championship
in racquets, and the Long Island hunt clubs counted
them among their best steeplechase riders. Lewis just
squeezed his way through college, but Winthrop, owing
to circumstances beyond his control, threatened to drop
by the academic roadside; the load of some seven condi-
tions was too heavy and too discouraging.

My chum, Winthrop's cousin mentioned above, was a
brilliant raconteur, and he used to spin out with wonder-
ful skill many a funny tale about my coaching experiences,
describing in a grotesque manner how an audacious
youngster, straying over here from a Serbian peasant
village, was bullying young aristocrats of New York, and
how these aristocrats were submitting to it like little
lambs. Rutherfurd, senior, who was my chum's uncle,
heard some of these humorous tales. He enjoyed them
hugely, and they suggested to him a scheme for diminish-
ing somewhat his son's heavy load of conditions. He
and his family were to spend the summer of 1882 in Eu-
rope, and he suggested that Winthrop and I go to his
country place, where we could rule supreme and spend
the summer preparing for Winthrop's autumn examina-
tions. Winthrop consented, in order to please his family,
and he agreed to the definite programme of work which
I prescribed. Rutherfurd, senior, was anxious that Win-
throp should breathe the atmosphere of Columbia College
for four years, even if he should not get the full benefit
of the college curriculum. He had a view of college edu-
cation which was somewhat novel to me and made me
understand more clearly the question which the captain
of the freshman crew had addressed to me in my freshman
year: ^' Study, work for a living, no participation in col-
lege activities outside of the recitation rooms ! Do you
call that college training?" But I shall return to this a
little later.

124 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

''Winthrop is very fond of you," said Rutherfurd,
senior, before he sailed for Europe, ''and if you fail to
pull him through, that will be the end of his college career.
Your job is a difficult one, almost hopeless, but if you
should succeed you would place me under a very great
obhgation." I was already under great obUgations to
him, for he had disclosed a view of the world of intellect
before my eyes such as nobody else ever had. New York
never produced a finer type of gentleman and scholar
than was Lewis Rutherfurd. His personahty impressed
me as Henry Ward Beecher's had, and I could easily
have persuaded myself that he was the reincarnation of
Benjamin Frankhn. I vowed to spare no effort in m^y
attempts to ''place" him "imder a very great obhgation."

Winthrop co-operated at first. But Winthrop's friends
at the Racquet Club, at the Rockaway Hunt Club, and
at Newport were puzzled, and they inquired what strange
influences kept Winthrop in monastic seclusion at the
Rutherfurd Stuyvesant estate in the backwoods of New
Jersey. Besides, a stableful of steeplechasers, which had
won many prizes, stood idle and looked in vain for their
master, Winthrop, to train them. Even the servants on
the estate looked puzzled and could not decipher the
mysterious change that had come over their young auto-
crat. A foreign-bom youngster, a namesake of Michael,
the Irish gardener on the estate, seemed to be supreme
in authority, and that puzzled the servants still more.
Winthrop was making great scholastic efforts, in order to
please his distinguished father, but he was a high-strung
youth and after a while his behavior began to suggest
the fretting of a thoroughbred protesting against the bit
handled by the heavy touch of an unskilled trainer. I
saw a crisis approaching, and it finally came. Winthrop
suddenly refused to do another stroke of work unless the
programme of work was greatly modified to permit him
to make occasional trips to the Racquet Club, to the

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 125

Rockaway Hunt Club, and to Newport. I knew what
that meant, and promptly refused; a hot discussion fol-
lowed, and some harsh words were spoken, resulting in a
challenge by Winthrop; I accepted and agreed that the
best man was to have his way during the remainder of
the summer. Winthrop, the great racquet player of
America, the famous steeplechase rider of Long Island,
and the yoimg aristocrat, kept his word, and responded
eagerly to my calls for additional scholastic efforts. He
was a noble, handsome, and manly American youth whose
friendship I was proud to possess.

In the autumn Winthrop got rid of most of his con-
ditions, proceeded with his class, and eventually graduated
from Columbia in 1884. Aly imaginative chum, Win-
throp's cousin, composed a great tale describing this
incident and called it: ^^A Serbian Peasant versus an
American Aristocrat.'^ Those who had the good fortime
to enjoy the himior of this tale (and among them was
F. Marion Crawford, the novehst and cousin of my chum)
pronounced it a great hterary accomphshment, and they
all agreed that Winthrop was the real hero of the story;
he had played the game hke a thoroughbred. Mr. Ruther-
furd, senior, enjoyed the tale as much as anybody, and
he was delighted with the result of our summer work.
Winthrop's behavior did not surprise him, because, he
assured me, Winthrop played the game as every Amer-
ican gentleman's son would have played it. '^ Every one
of your classmates," exclaimed this trustee of Columbia
College, ^' would have done the same thing; or he would
be unworthy of a Columbia degree." The first function
of the American college, according to him, was to train
its students in the principles of conduct becoming an
American who is loyal to the best traditions of his coun-
try.

My senior year opened even more auspiciously than
my sophomore or my junior year had. Lewis Ruther-

126 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

furd, trustee of Columbia College, gentleman and scholar,
and famous scientist, became my mentor. Winthrop's
success was to place him under very great obligations to
me, he had said before he sailed for Europe in the spring,
and after his return his actions proved that he had meant
even more than he had said. A father could not have
been more solicitous about my future plans than he was,
and his advice indicated that he understood my case
much better than I did myself. At the beginning of my
senior year I was still undecided as to what I was to do
after graduation, and I began to feel anxious; my men-
tor's advice was most welcome, and it certainly was one
of the determining factors of my futinre plans.

In my preceding account of my preparations for college
and of my life in college there is much which sounds like
a glorification of muscle and of the fighting spirit. I feel
almost like apologizing for it, but do I really owe an
apology? My whole life up to this point of my story
was steered by conditions which demanded muscle and
the fighting spirit. To pass six weeks during each one of
several summers as herdsman's assistant in company
with twelve other lively Serb youngsters as fellow assis-
tants, meant violent competitions in wrestling, swimming,
herdsman's hockey, and other strenuous games for hours
and hours each day, and one's position in this hvely com-
munity depended entirely upon muscle and the fighting
spirit. Magyarism in Panchevo and Teutonism in Prague
produced a reaction which appealed to muscle and to the
fighting spirit, which finally drove me to the land of Lin-
coln. Muscle and the fighting spirit of the bootblacks
and newsboys on Broadway met me on the very first
day when I ventured to pass beyond the narrow confines
of Castle Garden, in order to catch my first glimpse of
the great American metropohs. No sooner had I finished
serving my apprenticeship as greenhorn, and advanced

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 127

to a higher civic level, than I encountered again muscle
and the fighting spirit of the college boys. In the begin-
ning of my college career I found very little difference
between the pasture-lands of my native village and the
campus of the American college. The spirit of playful-
ness and the ferment of life in the hearts of youth were
the same in both, and were manifested in the same way,
namely, in athletics which encourage a glorification of
muscle and of the fighting spirit. This was most for-
tunate for me, because it offered me a wide avenue by
which I could enter with perfect ease into that wonderful
activity called college life. Other avenues existed, but
to a Serbian youth who but a few years before had been
a herdsman's assistant these other avenues were prac-
tically closed. I have described the avenue which was
open to me, but with no intention to indulge in an egotis-
tical glorification of that avenue.

Rutherfurd, my mentor, scholar, scientist, and trustee
of Colimibia College, did not believe as some people do
that athletics would ever cause our colleges to degenerate
into gladiatorial schools. Athletics in the form of wres-
thng and boxing did not interfere in the least with my
scholarship. Healthy young people and healthy young
nations are prone to worship the heroic element in human
life, thought trustee Rutherfurd, and, according to him,
the Greeks, by the art of physical culture, prevented this
exuberance of youth from degenerating into brutality.
He was longing forty years ago, and I am still longing to-
day, for the time when American colleges will have a four
years' course in physical culture, conducted by medical
and athletic experts. His sons, he thought, practised
this art by their devotion to the game of racquets and of
steeplechase riding. They were splendid athletes, but
nevertheless they were mellow-hearted and gentle youths.
The fact that their scholarship was not high did not dis-
turb their learned father, because much of his own scholar-

128 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ship and scientific learning, he told me, had been acquired
long after he had graduated from Williams College.

Many of my fellow students were, just like myself,
very fond of athletics and of other activities outside of
the college curriculum, and yet we were enthusiastic
students of Greek literature, of history and economics, of
constitutional history of the United States, and of Eng-
lish literature. But here was the secret: Professor Mer-
riam was a wonderful expounder of the great achievements
of Greek civilization ; Professor Monroe Smith made every
one of us feel that history was an indispensable part of
our daily life; Professor Richmond !Mayo-Smith made
us believe that political economy was one of the most
important subjects in the world; and Professor Burgess'
lectures on the Constitutional History of the United
States made us all imagine that we understood the spirit
of 1776 just as well as Hamilton did. These professors
were the great scholars of Columbia College when I was
a student there, and they had most attractive person-
alities too. The personality of the professors, like that of
the famous Van Amringe, and their learning, hke that of
the venerable President Barnard, were the best safeguards
for students who showed a tendency to devote themselves
too niuch to the worship of muscle and the fighting spirit,
and of activities outside of the college curriculum. Fill
your professorial chairs in colleges with men of broad
learning, and of conrnaanding personality, and do not
worry about the alleged evil influences of athletics, and
of other college activities outside of the recitation-room.
That was the recommendation of trustee Rutherfurd
forty years ago; to-day I add: the college needs great
professors just as much as the various reseaich depart-
ments of a university need them; perhaps even more.

Literary societies, college journalism, glee-club practice,
and exercises in the dramatic art consumed, when I was a
college student, just as much of the college student's time

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 129

as athletics did. They and athletics constituted the outside
college activities. The recitation-room brought the stu-
dent into touch with the personalities of the professors;
college activities outside of the recitation-room, whether
they were athletics or anything else, brought the student
into touch with the personalities of his fellow students.
Each one of these influences had, according to the ex-
periences of my college life, its own great value, and con-
tributed its distinct share to what is usually called the
character-forming of the college student, but what Ruther-
furd, the Columbia College trustee, called training in the
principles of conduct becoming an American who is loyal
to the best traditions of his country. Neither one nor
the other influence can be weakened without crippling
seriously that great object which trustee Rutherfurd
called 'Hhe historical mission of the American college.'^
There was another educational activity which should
be mentioned here. My regular attendance at Plymouth
Church I considered one of my most important college
activities outside of the recitation-room. Beecher's ser-
mons and Booth's interpretations of Shakespeare were
sources of stirring inspiration. They occupied a very
high place among my spiritual guides. Beecher, Booth,
and several other men of genius who were active in New
York in those days were, as far as my college training
was concerned, members of the Columbia College faculty.
This is what I probably meant whea I said to my friends
at the Adelphi Academy that "Columbia College in the
City of New York" was the port for which I was saihng
and that Beecher's church in Brooklyn was a component
part of Columbia College. Taking college activities in
this broader sense I always believed that the spiritual,
intellectual, and artistic activities in the city of New
York were component parts of Columbia College; they
certainly contributed much to the fulness of my college
life. I often wondered whether this was in the minds of

130 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

those who framed the official name '^ Columbia College
in the City of New York," when the old name ^'King's
College" was abandoned in 1787.

I have nearly fiDished the story of my college career,
and I am aware that it is silent on a subject which was
always dear to my heart; that subject is science. A young
lad w^ho was stimulated so much by the lives of the
men represented in the Cooper Union library painting,
entitled ^' Men of Progress"; by the splendid scien-
tific exhibits in Philadelphia in 1876; by Jim's boiler-
room demonstrations supplemented by Cooper Union
lectures on heat; by TyndalFs and Hunt's poetic descrip-
tions of scientific achievements; and above all by his
own visions concerning physical phenomena on the pas-
ture-lands of his native village — that lad goes through
college, and the story of his college career is nearly closed
without saying anything about his scientific studies at
Columbia College ! That certainly looks strange, and
suggests the inference that after all Bilharz had finally
succeeded in tearing me away completely from what he
called the worship of scientific materialism. Bilharz did
not succeed in that, but what he actually did is worth
relating here.

After my departure from Cortlandt Street, Bilharz
felt quite lonesome and tried to get companionship and
consolation from a Tyrolean zither which he managed
well in spite of his stiff fingers. Knowing my fondness
for Homer's heroic verse and for the lyric verse in the
chorus of Greek dramas, he practised reciting them with
zither accompaniment. He thus imitated most success-
fully a Serbian guslar's recitations of old Serbian bal-
lads, accompanied by the single-string instrument, called
gusle. In recognition of the success of his clever scheme,
which, I was sure, he had devised for my special benefit,
I called him the Greek guslar. He who has seen huge

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 131

multitudes of Serbs assembled around a blind guslar in
the midst of some great festive gathering, Ustening by
the hour in spellbound silence to his recitations, will
understand how Billiarz managed to attract me to many
a neighborhood gathering on the top loft of the Cortlandt
Street factory. Every time I listened to the zither ac-
companying his chanting of familiar Greek verses I imag-
ined that Baba Batikin's spirit was transferred from the
little peasant village of Idvor to the great metropolis of
America! Whenever I told him that, he seemed to be
inmiensely pleased, because the life of a bhnd guslar ap-
pealed to him much. Professor Merriam was certainly
a great Greek scholar, but Bilharz was a great Greek
guslar, and when he chanted the verses of the IHad wdth
zither accompaniment I was tempted to imagine that
he was a reincarnation of Homer. Between Bilharz and
Merriam I could not help devoting much of my time in
college to the study of Greek. I have never regretted it,
but I do regret that the academic halls of the American
colleges of to-day do not resound any more with that
solemn Greek rhythm which I first heard on the top loft
of the Cortlandt Street factory. Bilharz disappeared
from Cortlandt Street a short time before I graduated,
and he left me his zither as a souvenir, and also an old
edition of Homer's Iliad by the famous German phi-
lologist Dindorf. I have not seen hun since that time,
but I shall never forget him. He was the first to call my
attention to an old and magnificent civilization, the spir-
itual beauty of which appealed to my young imagination
with increasing force as my knowledge of it increased.
I often recall his almost fanatical disHke of m.echanisms,
and wonder what he would say to-day if he heard the
pianola, the phonograph, and some of the distortions
of radio broadcasting, to say nothing of the dramatic
atrocities of the kinematograph !

On the other hand, the growth of my understanding

132 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

from the first day of my landing at Castle Garden was
due to my feeding upon the spiritual food offered to me
daily by a civilization in which I was Hving, and which
I wished to understand but did not understand. My
preparation for college lifted here and there the mist
which prevented my vision from seeing the clear outline
of American civilization. Columbia College brought me
into touch with the college life of American boys and
with men of great learning and wonderful personahties,
and they helped me to dispel every particle of that mist,
and there in the clear sunshine of their learning I saw
the whole imago of what I believed to be American civih-
zation: a beautiful daughter of a beautiful mother, which
is the Anglo-Saxon civilization. The memory of this
vision always recalled to my mind the ode of Horace
which opens with the line:

''0 matre pulchra filia pulchrior!"

The study and the contemplation of these two civili-
zations, the ancient civilization of Greece and the new
civilization of the Anglo-Saxons, which appealed to me
as the two greatest civilizations of human history, made
every other study in my college curriculum appear in-
significant, although I gamed several prizes in the exact
sciences, and although I never gave up the idea that my
future work would be in the field of science.

But there is another and perhaps the most potent reason
why science figures so little in the preceding part of the
story of m^y college career. Instruction in the exact
sciences in those days was most elementary, not only at
Columbia College but also in most American colleges.
For instance, laboratory work in physics and in chemistry
was not a part of the Columbia College curriculum, and
the lectiu:e-room told me less about physics than I had
known from my studies of TyndalFs popular publications
and from the Cooper Union instruction before I entered

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 133

college. The question ^^What is Light?" I brought with
me from the pasture-lands of my native village, and the
professor of physics at Columbia College offered no an-
swer to it except to refer to vibrations in an ether, the
physical properties of which he admitted he could not
satisfactorily describe. On this point he did not seem to
be much wiser than my humble teacher Kos in Panchevo.
My mentor, Rutherfurd, was always interested in this
question, as in many other advanced questions in science,
and he took much delight in discussing them with me.
He was the first to inform me that the great question,
''What is Light?" would probably be answered when
we understood more clearly a new electrical theory ad-
vanced by a Scotch physicist. Maxwell by name, who
was a pupil of the great Faraday.

One day toward the end of my senior year I told my
mentor, Rutherfurd, of a lecture-room experiment per-
formed by Rood, his friend, at that time professor of
physics at Columbia College. This experiment was the
first announcement to me that Faraday was one of the
great discoverers in electrical science. The experiment
was simplicity itself, and consisted of a loose coil of copper
wire, held in the left hand of the lecturing professor, the
terminals of the coil being connected to a galvanometer
supported on the wall of the lecture-room, so that its
needle could be seen by every student in the room. When
Rood, Hke a magician manipulating a wand, moved with
his right hand a small magnet toward the coil, the distant
galvanometer needle, impelled by a force which up to
that time was a mystery to me, swung violently in one
direction, and when the magnet was moved away from
the coil the galvanometer needle swung just as violently
in the opposite direction. When one terminal, only, of
the coil was connected to the galvanometer, and thus
the electric circuit of the coil was broken, the motion
of the magnet produced no effect. ''This is Faraday's

134 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

discovery of Electromagnetic Induction.^' said Rood with a
deep sigh, and ended the lecture without any further
comment, as if he wished to give me a chance to think
it over before he added additional information. Ruther-
furd knew Rood's picturesque mannerism, and my de-
scription of the experiment amused him. He suggested
that the good professor was very fond of mystifying his
students. I certainly was much mystified and did not
wait for the next lecture to clear the mystery, but spent
all day and most of the night reading about Faraday's
wonderful discovery. It was made over fifty years be-
fore that time, but I had never known anything about it,
although Edison's dynamos in his New York Pearl Street
station had been supplying for over a year thousands of
customers with electric power for incandescent lighting.
Columbia College was not one of these customers for a
long time after my graduation. When I finished my
description of the experiment, and assured Rutherfurd
that it was the most thrilling physical phenomenon that
I had ever seen, and that I had remained awake almost
all night after seeing it, he looked pleased, and informed
me that this very phenomenon was the basis of Max-
well's new Electrical Theory.

That was the experiment which helped me to decide
a very weighty question. Professor Rood had informed
me that in recognition of my high standing in science as
well as in letters I could choose either of two graduate
fellowships, one in letters or one in science, each worth
five hundred dollars a year. Either would have meant
an additional three years of graduate study at Columbia.
I was much tempted to turn to letters and continue my
work with Merriam, the idol of all Columbia College
students, including myself, who had felt the wonderful
charm of his personality and of his profound and at the
same time most picturesque classical scholarship. But
the magic experiment which had told me the first story

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSHIP 135

of Faraday's great discoveries, and had aroused my dor-
mant enthusiasm for physics, caused me to bid good-by
to Merriam and turn to science, my first love. Never-
theless, I did not accept the fellowship in science and
stay three years longer at Columbia; I preferred to take
up the study of Faraday and of Maxwell in the United
Kingdom, where these two great physicists were born
and where they had made their great discoveries. Trustee
Rutherfurd and his young nephew, my chum and class-
mate, John Armstrong Chanler, applauded my decision,
and promised to assist me in my undertaking whenever
assistance should be needed. Rutherfurd assured me that
I should certainly succeed as well in my scientific studies
in European universities as I had succeeded in my gen-
eral cultural studies at Columbia College, if the revela-
tions of the new world of physics, certainly in store for
me, could arouse in me the same enthusiasm which had
been aroused by the revelations of that new spirit and
that new current of thought which had given birth to
the American civilization. That this enthusiasm would
not be wanting was amply demonstrated, he said, by the
effect which Faraday's fundamental experiment had pro-
duced in my imagination.

Professor Burgess, my teacher in constitutional his-
tory, had assured me, toward the end of the senior year,
that I was fully prepared for American citizenship,
and I had applied for my» naturalization papers. I re-
ceived them on the day before I was graduated. Two
ceremonies which are recorded in my life as two red-letter
days took place on two successive days; it is instructive
to give here a brief comparison between them. The cere-
mony which made me a citizen of the United States took
place in a dingy little office in one of the municipal build-
ings in City Hall Park. I received my diploma of Bache-
lor of Arts in the famous old Academy of Music on Four-
teenth Street on the following day. There was nobody

136 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

in the naturalization office to witness the naturalization
ceremony except myself and a plain little clerk. The
graduation ceremonies in the Academy of Music were
presided over by the venerable President Barnard; his
luxuriant snowy-white locks and long beard, and his
luminous intelligence beaming from every feature of his
wonderful face, gave him the appearance of Moses, as
Michael Angelo represents him; and the academy was
crowded with a distinguished and brilliant audience.
The little clerk in the office handed me my naturalization
papers in an offhand manner, thinking, apparently, of
nothing but the fee due from me. President Barnard,
knowing of my high standing in the graduating class and
of my many struggles to get there, beamed with joy when
he handed me my diploma amidst the applause of my
numerous friends in the audience. When I left the natu-
ralization office, carrying my precious multicolored and
very ornate naturalization papers, the crowd in City
Hall Park was moving about as though nothing had hap-
pened ; but when I stepped down from the academy stage,
with my Columbia diploma in hand, my old friend Doc-
tor Shepard handed me a basket of roses with the best
wishes of his family and of Henry Ward Beecher; Mr.
and Mrs. Lukanitch were there, and the old lady kissed
me, shedding tears copiously and assuring me that if
my mother were there to see how well I looked in my
academic silk gown she also would have shed many a
tear of joy; numerous other friends were there and made
much fuss over me, but all those things served only to
increase the painful contrast between the gay commence-
ment ceremonies and the prosy procedure of my natu-
ralization on the preceding day. One ceremony made
me only a Bachelor of Arts. The other made me a citizen
of the United States. Which of the two should have
been more solemn ?

There was a picture which I had conjured up in my

FROM GREENHORN TO CITIZENSIIIP 137

imagination when first I walked one day from the Cort-
landt Street factory to Wall Street to see the site of old
Federal Hall. The picture was that of Chancellor Living-
ston administering the constitutional oath of office to
President Washington. To me it was a picture of the
most solemn historical act which New York or any other
place in the world ever had witnessed. When the little
clerk in the naturalization office handed me my natural-
ization papers, and called upon me in a perfunctory way
to promise that I would always be loyal to the Consti-
tution of the United States, the picture of that historical
scene in Federal Hall suddenly reappeared to me, and
a strange mental exaltation made my voice tremble as I
responded: ^^I will, so help me God!'' The little clerk
noticed my emotion, but did not understand it, because
he did not know of my long-continued efforts throughout
a period of nine years to prepare myself for citizenship of
the United States.

As I sat on the deck of the ship which was taking me
to the universities of Europe, and watched its eagerness
to get away from the busy harbor of New York, I thought
of the day when, nine years before, I had arrived on the
immigrant ship. I said to myself: ^^ Michael Pupin, the
most valuable asset which you carried into New York
harbor nine years ago was your knowledge of, and pro-
found respect and admiration for, the best traditions
of your race . . . the most valuable asset which you are
now taking with you from New York harbor is your knowl-
edge of, and profound respect and admiration for, the
best traditions of your adopted country."

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR IN ELEVEN

YEARS

It was a beautiful June afternoon when from the gay
deck of the State of Florida I saw the low coast-line of
Long Island disappear in the distance. With it disap-
peared the land the first glimpse of which I had caught
so eagerly on that sunny March morning nine years be-
fore, when the immigrant ship Westphalia carried me
into New York harbor. As I had approached this coast
my busy imagination had suggested that it was the edge
of the cover of a great and mysterious book which I had
to read and decipher. I had read it for nine long years,
and my beHef that I had deciphered it made me confident
that I was quite rich in learning. Besides, there were my
Bachelor of Arts diploma and my naturahzation papers;
and, of course, I thought, they were the best evidence in
the world that I was returning to see my mother again
rich in learning and in academic honors, as I had promised
her nine years before in that letter from Hamburg.

The sky was clear, the sea was smooth, and its sharp
and even horizon fine toward which the ship was heading
promised a peaceful temper of the powers which controlled
the motions of the air above and of the waters below our
ship. The comforts of the ship and the fair prospects of
a fine voyage were recorded in the smiling faces of my
fellow passengers. A group of Hvely schoolgirls from
Washington, making their first trip to Europe under the
guidance of an old professor with long gray hair and
shaggy beard, looked like so many nymphs playing around

138

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 139

a drowsy Neptune. They formed the central group of
the happy passengers. There were a number of college
boys on board. Some of them had friends among the
Washington nymphs; by clever manoeuvring it was ar-
ranged that the college boys, including myself, should
sit at the same table with the playful nymphs. The gray-
locked professor, whom I called Father Neptune (and
the title stuck to him), was somewhat reluctant at first,
but finally he gave his consent to this ^'wonderful" prop-
osition, as the girls called it, and he sat at the head of
the table, presiding with a dignity which fully demon-
strated that he deserved the title '^Father Neptune."
The jolly captain assured us that his good old ship never
carried a more exuberant company of youngsters across
the Atlantic. But this was not the fierce Atlantic which
I had seen nine years before. It was an Atlantic which
apparently studied to please and to amuse. All kinds of
pleasant things happened during the voyage, as if ar-
ranged purposely for our amusement. Many schools of
porpoises approached the merry ship, and I suggested
that they visited us in order to pay their respects to Father
Neptune and his beautiful nymphs. This suggestion was
accepted with vociferous acclamation, and it was agreed
that free play be granted to our imaginations. Let your
fancy take any course at your own risk, was our motto.
When the visiting porpoises hustled off like a squadron
of reconnoitring horsemen leaping gaily over the smooth
waves, as if in a merry steeplechase, it was suggested by
one of the girls with a lively imagination that they were
anxious to report to the chief of staff of a great host which,
hidden in the depths of the quiescent Atlantic, controlled
the ocean waves. She, the oracle, as we called her,
prophesied that when these heralds had delivered the
report that Father Neptune and his fair nymphs were
passing in triumphal procession through their watery
realm, then all things in the heavens above and in the

140 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

sea below would bow to the will of Neptune and his play-
ful crew.

Two spouting whales appeared one day in the distance,
and our busy imaginations suggested that they were
two men-o'-war, sent by the friendly submarine host to
pay their homage to Neptune and his nymphs, and to
serve as escort to our speedy ship. Nothing happened
which did not receive a fanciful interpretation by our
playful imaginations. The wonderful phosphorescence
of the waves, which were ploughed up in the smooth sea
by the gliding ship, supported the illusion that our voy-
age was a triumphal procession along an avenue illumi-
nated by the mysterious phosphorescent glow. We were
headed for Scotland, by a route which passed to the north
of Ireland, and as our course approached the northern
latitudes the luminous twilights of the North Atlantic
made us almost forget that there ever was such a thing
as a dark night. Good old Neptune had quite a job to
round up his nymphs in the late hours of the evening and
make them turn in and exchange the joys of the busy
days for the blessings of the restful nights. His job was
hopeless when the northern midnights displayed the awe-
inspiring streamers of the northern lights, and that hap-
pened quite frequently. Those wonderful sights in them-
selves would have made it worth while crossing the At-
lantic. On such evenings the exuberance of the college
boys and of the schoolgirls from Washington was wide
awake until after midnight, watching the luminous and
continuously changing streamers of the polar regions,
telling stories, and singing college songs. These evenings
reminded me much of the neighborhood gatherings in
Idvor. One of them was devoted to original stories; each
member of the gay party had to spin out an original tale.
My story was called '^Franciscus of Freiburg," and it
referred to Bilharz, the Greek guslar of Cortlandt Street.
Thft disappointments of his youth, the calm resignation

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 141

with which in his more mature years he passed his hermit
days on a top loft in Cortlandt Street, and his search for
consolation in the poetry of Rome and Greece made quite
an impression; and to my great surprise there was not a
single giggle on the part of the irrepressible nymphs.
This was the first story that I ever composed, and it made
a hit, but its success was completely ruined when,
prompted by modesty, I suggested that any tale describ-
ing disappointments in love is sure to be taken very seri-
ously and sympathetically by young girls. A violent
protest was filed by the girls, and I pleaded guilty of the
offense of disturbing public peace. A mock trial, with
Father Neptune as the presiding judge, condemned me
and imposed the fine that I tell at once, and without
preparation, another original tale. I described the first
speech of my life on St. Sava's day, some thirteen years
earlier, and its unexpected effect upon my mischievous
chums in Idvor, comparing it with the unexpected effect
of my Franciscus story. I regretted it, because the fairies
from Washington had an endless chain of questions about
Idvor and my prospective visit to it. Never before had
I had a better opportunity to observe the beautiful rela-
tionship between American boys and girls. Its founda-
tion I recognized to be the idea of the big brother look-
ing after the safety, comfort, and happiness of his sister,
the same idea which is glorified in the Serbian national
ballads.

One pleasant incident followed another in quick suc-
cession during our triumphant procession over the north-
ern Atlantic, and all the powers which control the temper
of the ocean were most kind and generous to us, just as
our fair oracle had prophesied it. When the clijffs of Scot-
land hove in sight, reminding us that our voyage was
approaching its end, there was no thrill of joy such as
there was when the immigrant ship, which first took me
into New York harbor, approached the Long Island coast.

140 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

sea below would bow to the will of Neptune and his play-
ful crew.

Two spouting whales appeared one day in the distance,
and our busy imaginations suggested that they were
two men-o'-war, sent by the friendly submarine host to
pay their homage to Neptune and his nymphs, and to
serve as escort to our speedy ship. Nothing happened
which did not receive a fanciful interpretation by our
playful imaginations. The wonderful phosphorescence
of the waves, which were ploughed up in the smooth sea
by the gliding ship, supported the illusion that our voy-
age was a triumphal procession along an avenue illumi-
nated by the mysterious phosphorescent glow. We were
headed for Scotland, by a route which passed to the north
of Ireland, and as our course approached the northern
latitudes the luminous twilights of the North Atlantic
made us almost forget that there ever was such a thing
as a dark night. Good old Neptune had quite a job to
round up his nymphs in the late hours of the evening and
make them turn in and exchange the joys of the busy
days for the blessings of the restful nights. His job was
hopeless when the northern midnights displayed the awe-
inspiring streamers of the northern lights, and that hap-
pened quite frequently. Those wonderful sights in them-
selves would have made it worth while crossing the At-
lantic. On such evenings the exuberance of the college
boys and of the schoolgirls from Washington was wide
awake until after midnight, watching the luminous and
continuously changing streamers of the polar regions,
telling stories, and singing college songs. These evenings
reminded me much of the neighborhood gatherings in
Idvor. One of them was devoted to original stories; each
member of the gay party had to spin out an original tale.
My story was called "Franciscus of Freiburg," and it
referred to Bilharz, the Greek guslar of Cortlandt Street.
Th^ disappointments of his youth, the calm resignation

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 141

with which in his more mature years he passed his hermit
days on a top loft in Cortlandt Street, and his search for
consolation in the poetry of Rome and Greece made quite
an impression; and to my great surprise there was not a
single giggle on the part of the irrepressible nymphs.
This was the first story that I ever composed, and it made
a hit, but its success was completely ruined when,
prompted by modesty, I suggested that any tale describ-
ing disappointments in love is sure to be taken very seri-
ously and sympathetically by young girls. A violent
protest was filed by the girls, and I pleaded guilty of the
offense of disturbing public peace. A mock trial, with
Father Neptune as the presiding judge, condemned me
and imposed the fine that I tell at once, and without
preparation, another original tale. I described the first
speech of my life on St. Sava's day, some thirteen years
earlier, and its unexpected effect upon my mischievous
chums in Idvor, comparing it with the unexpected effect
of my Franciscus story. I regretted it, because the fairies
from Washington had an endless chain of questions about
Idvor and my prospective visit to it. Never before had
I had a better opportunity to observe the beautiful rela-
tionship between American boys and girls. Its founda-
tion I recognized to be the idea of the big brother look-
ing after the safety, comfort, and happiness of his sister,
the same idea which is glorified in the Serbian national
ballads.

One pleasant incident followed another in quick suc-
cession during our triumphant procession over the north-
ern Atlantic, and all the powers which control the temper
of the ocean were most kind and generous to us, just as
our fair oracle had prophesied it. When the cliffs of Scot-
land hove in sight, reminding us that our voyage was
approaching its end, there was no thrill of joy such as
there was when the immigrant ship, which first took me
into New York harbor, approached the Long Island coast.

144 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

to Cambridge and study under Professor James Clerk
Maxwell, the creator of the new electrical theory. Niven
looked puzzled and asked me who had told me of this new
theory, and when I mentioned Rutherfurd, he asked me
what Rutherfurd had told me about it. '^That it will
probably give a satisfactory answer to the question:
'What is Light? ^" I answered, and watched for his reac-
tion. ''Did not Mr. Rutherfurd tell you that Clerk Max-
well died four years ago?" asked Niven, and when I said
no, he asked me whether I had not seen it in the preface
to the second edition of Maxwell's great book which Niven
himself had edited. This question embarrassed me, and
I confessed frankly that Rutherfurd's son, my chum
Winthrop, had presented me with this book on the day
of the sailing of my ship ; that it was packed away in my
bags; and that I did not have any time to examine it
during the voyage, because I was too busy helping to
entertain twelve beautiful schoolgirls from Washington,
who were making their first trip to Europe. Niven
laughed heartily and admitted, jokingly, that twelve
beautiful girls from Washington were certainly more
attractive than any theory, not excepting even Max-
well's great electrical theory. He suggested then that
I could study at Cambridge under Lord Rayleigh, who
had succeeded Maxwell as professor of physics. I de-
chned the suggestion on the ground that I had never
heard of Lord Rayleigh before. Niven laughed again,
even more heartily than before, and assiured me that
Lord Rayleigh was a great physicist in spite of the fact
that his great fame had never reached my ears. An Eng-
lish lord a great physicist ! The idea struck me as strange,
but Niven looked so friendly and so sincere that I could
not help believing that he really meant what he said.
He invited me to lunch, and before we parted I assured
him that I would come back to Cambridge in the follow-
ing October and place myself under his guidance.

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 145

This conference with Niven sobered me up very con-
siderably; it convinced me that my great aspiration and
my small preparation in physics were far from being of
the same order of magnitude. I confessed to Niven that
my success in winning prizes in science at Columbia Col-
lege had led to my belief that I knew more physics than
I really did. ^^ Confession is a splendid thing for the soul,"
said Niven, and added: ^^But do not permit that any-
thing I have said dampen your courage. A physicist
needs courage, and few mortals were braver than Max-
well. The world knows only a little of his great elec-
trical theory, but it knows even less of his great moral
courage." He gave me a copy of Campbell's life of Max-
well; I read it from cover to cover before I left London,
and it contributed much to the learning which I had
promised to bring to Idvor. It certainly convinced me
that Maxwell had a vastly better knowledge of physics
when he graduated at Cambridge than I had picked up
at Columbia. That gave me much healthy food for seri-
ous thought.

A straight line from London to Idvor passes through
Switzerland, and I proposed to follow that line in my
journey as closely as practicable. My ticket took me
from London to Lucerne directly; the journey from Lu-
cerne to Idvor I left undetermined until I reached Lu-
cerne. I had no time nor inclination to explore the
wonders of London, Paris, or of any other great place in
Europe before I had seen Idvor again. Mother, Idvor,
and Maxwell's new electrical theory had brought me to
Europe, and I wished to see them as soon as possible,
and in the order named; everything else could wait. Be-
sides, I sincerely believed that these places had little to
offer to a fellow like me, who knew the great things of
New York. I was much disposed to look down upon
things in Europe, a mental attitude which is not uncom-
mon among American immigrants when they go back to

146 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

pay a temporary visit to Europe. I had it quite strongly,
but sobering experiences like the conference with Niven
in Cambridge helped me to apply suitable correction
factors to this mental attitude. The following brief
description of one of these experiences bears upon this
point.

The London-Lucerne train crossed the Franco-Swiss
frontier very early in the morning, somewhere near Neu-
chatel. The delay necessary for the rearrangement of
the train gave the passengers ample time to enjoy their
breakfast in the garden of the station restaurant. A look
to the east caught a sight which made me almost forget
my breakfast. The distant snow-covered Alps, bathed
in the early sunshine and projected against the back-
ground of the luminous blue sky of a July morning, fur-
nished a picture never to be forgotten. I had never seen
the Alps before, and this first view of them was of over-
powering beauty. An Englishman, a fellow traveller,
sitting opposite me at the breakfast-table, noticed my
mental exaltation, and asked: ''You have never seen the
Alps before, have you?" ''No," said I. "Oh, what a
lucky lad you are !" said the EngUshman, adding that he
would give much to be in my place. He confessed that
he had to climb the peaks of the Alps in order to get those
thrills which in former days, when he was of my age, he
got by looking at them from the valleys below. At his
suggestion we continued our journey to Lucerne in the
same compartment, and the stories of his climbing ex-
ploits stirred up mightily my imagination, which was
already throbbing under the inspiration of the Alpine
view which had greeted me that morning. When I in-
formed him that I was in a hurry to reach my native
village of Idvor, otherwise I might try some climbing
myself, he assured me that a ten days' delay in Lucerne
would suffice to prepare me for climbing one of the lesser

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 147

peaks, and he mentioned Titlis, not far from Lucerne.
He prescribed the training which would provide me with
sufficiently steady Alpine legs. From the peak of the
Titlis, he said, I could see old Switzerland where the fa-
mous legend was born which relates how Tell drove the
fear of God into the hearts of the Austrians. I always
loved that legend, perhaps because I did not love the
Austrian tyrants. Wlien the train had reached Lucerne I
saw the wonderful Alpine panorama spread out like an
amphitheatre of snow-covered Alpine peaks around its
deep-blue lake, and I knew that in spite of my great
haste to reach Idvor I would not leave this fairy-land
before I had reached the snow-covered peak of Titlis.

I immediately hired a rowboat for a week, and, clad
in a rowing shirt with blue and white Columbia stripes
and thin tennis trousers, I spent that afternoon explor-
ing the beauty spots of the meandering shore of the his-
toric lake. The joy of rowing and the busy rays of the
July sun made me yield to the invitation of the clear
waters of the lake to plunge in and hug the waves, which
once upon a time carried Tell to safety after he had sent
his arrow through the heart of the Austrian tyrant, Gess-
ler. As if imitating the example of Tell, I jumped in just
as I was, trusting that subsequent rowing and the sun
would dry my scanty attire, and they did. A glorious
feeling of freedom from all earthly restraints came over
me as, floating on my back, I beheld the blue sky above
and the snow-covered peaks around me. It was the same
sky and the same luminous peaks, I thought, which five
hundred years before saw William Tell chase away the
Austrian tyrants from the historic cantons surrounding
the lake; from Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden. I felt
that I was floating in the very cradle where real freedom
first saw the light of day. No other spot on earth was
more w^orthy of that immortal fame. My admiration
for it never faded after that memorable July afternoon.

148 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Europe rose in my estimation; I was much less inclined
to look down upon things European.

The next day I was up very early, feeling '^as a strong
man ready to run a race/' the same feeling which I had
experienced at Castle Garden when, nine years before, I
woke up early in the morning and hurried off to catch
my first glimpse of the great American metropolis. I
was just as anxious to hurry off and catch from some
mountain-top my first glimpse of Switzerland. Mindful
of the suggestions of my English acquaintance on the
train, I started with the easiest climb, the Rigi Culm.
It is a very easy effort, but I made it difficult by rowing
first some ten miles to Weggis, going up to the Rigi and
walking down, and then rowing back to Lucerne again
on the same day, in the waning hours of the afternoon.
An unexpected squall upset my boat, and I had quite a
struggle to get back to Lucerne, very late in the evening.
The hotel proprietor noticed my mussed-up appearance,
but said nothing, seeing that I was not in a communica-
tive mood.

The same strenuous method of preparatory training
for the Titlis climb took me up to Mount Pilatus on the
next day. But I was not allowed to return on the same
day on account of a fierce thunder-storm raging in the
valley below, which I watched from the top of the Pilatus.
The innkeeper congratulated me upon my rare luck, not
only because I had a chance to see the beautiful sight of
a thunder-storm as viewed from a point above the thun-
dering clouds, but principally because this thunder-storm
prevented me from running the serious risk of descend-
ing and rowing back to Lucerne on the same day. Com-
menting upon the overconfidence of youth, the innkeeper
said that every person has a guardian angel, but people
intoxicated by wine or by exuberance of youth have two,
one on each side. That was his explanation for the al-
leged fact, he said, that young people and intoxicated

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 149

people seldom meet with serious accidents in mountain
climbing. Some Americans, he thought, should have
several guardian angels. This sarcasm was auned at
me, and it did not miss its mark.

Nevertheless, when on my fifth day in Lucerne I started
out very early for the Titlis, I adopted the same strenu-
ous method: rowing to Stansstadt, walking to Engelberg,
and climbing to the hospice where I arrived at 11 p. m.
I reached at sunrise of the following morning the top of
Titlis, and saw the glories of Uri, Schwyz, and Unter-
walden as my English friend had promised. But I reached
it much exhausted, and if it had not been for the skilled
assistance of my trusty Swiss guide, the last four lines
of Longfellow's ^^ Excelsior" would have described my
Titlis climb quite accurately. I quote the lines:

"There in the twihght cold and gray,
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay.
And from the sky, serene and far,
A voice fell, like a falling star,
Excelsior!"

Returning from Titlis, I ran into my English friend, and
he remarked that I looked a little overtrained. We dined
together, and when I told him the story of my six days'
Alpine experience, he begged me to hustle off to Idvor
and see my mother first, and then return if I cared to
pursue my own methods of exploring the beauties of Swit-
zerland. '^If you continue pursuing these methods now,
I am afraid that your mother will never see you again,
because there are not enough guardian angels in all the
heavens to prevent you from breaking your neck." I
agreed, but assured him that my overstrenuous method
of climbing Titlis was worth the risk; it had humbled
my vanity and false pride, and made me more respectful
to some of the slow ways of old Europe. It convinced
me that even after serving my apprenticeship as green-

150 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

horn in the United States, I could still be a most verdant
greenhorn in Europe. The railroad journey from Lu-
cerne to Vienna afforded me much leisure time for phil-
osophic reflections upon this matter. Thanks to Niven
in Cambridge and to my English friend in Lucerne, I
reached Vienna with a mental attitude considerably dif-
ferent from and certainly much less exalted than that
which I had taken along when I sailed from New York
four weeks before.

The railroad-station at Vienna where I took the train
for Budapest looked quite familiar, although I had seen
it but once before. I did not discover the great and
mighty station-master who at my first appearance there,
eleven years before, nearly sent me back to the prisons
of the military frontier. The conductor, however, who
called me ^'Gnaediger Herr" (gracious sir), when near
Gaenserndorf he asked me for my first-class ticket, was
the same man who, eleven years before, had called me a
Serbian swineherd. I recognized him easily, although he
looked very humble and had lost the fierceness which he
had displayed when he roughly pulled me off my seat on
that memorable first raihoad journey from Budapest to
Vienna. He failed to recall to memory the Serbian boy
with yellow sheepskin coat and cap and the gaily colored
bag. I gave him a generous tip as a reward for driving
me into the arms of my good American friends who had
seen me safely landed in Prague, and the memory of
v/hose kind act had suggested my running off to the land
of Lincoln.

^'America is the land of rapid changes," he said, when
I told him that I was that boy, and he added: ^'You
must have changed m^uch, looking as you do like a real
American; but we here and our dear old Austria are like
all old people; we do not change except to grow older
and more decrepit." He expressed exactly what I felt

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 151

as I looked to the right and to the left of the train which
was taking me to Budapest. Everything seemed to move
slowly, with the deliberate step of feeble old age. Buda-
pest looked small, and the suspension bridge, which had
nearly taken my breath away eleven years before, when
I first saw it, looked puny in comparison with the Brook-
lyn suspension bridge.

I spent no time in looking around to explore the vir-
tues of the Magyar metropolis, but hustled, and pres-
ently I was on the boat which eleven years before had
brought me to Budapest. I could hardly believe that it
was the same boat. It must have shrunk incredibly, I
thought, or else my life in America had changed the vision
of my eyes. Everything I saw looked small and shrivelled
up, and if I had not seen the snow-covered giants of Swit-
zerland as viewed from the top of Titlis, Europe itself
might have appeared to me as small and shrivelled up.

When supper was served I noticed that everybody hacf
atrocious table manners, even people of high official rank,
several of whom I discovered among my fellow passengers.
Eleven years before everybody on the boat had looked so
high and mighty that I was almost afraid to look at them,
but this time I was much tempted to imagine that I was
considerably above most of my fellow passengers. I
resisted the temptation. It was a good thing that my
climbing of the Titlis had nearly floored me; it suppressed
much of that haughtiness which naturalized American
immigrants bring with them when they visit Europe.

The next morning I noticed a group of Serb students
who were returning home from the universities of Vienna
and Budapest. They were from my native Voyvodina,
and not frorri Serbia, as I found out later. Their appear-
ance did not impress me very agreeably, but nevertheless
I quivered with delight when I heard their Serb language.
They spoke freely, although they must have noticed

152 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

that they attracted my attention. One of them remarked
that I could pass for a Serb, if it were not for my manner,
my dress, and my very ruddy complexion. The voyage
across the Atlantic and a week's tramping in Switzerland
were responsible for my exaggerated ruddiness. A second
one thought that young Serb peasants in Banat are just
as ruddy, particularly during the harvest season, but he
admitted that my appearance did not suggest that my
occupation was that of a peasant. Another one sug-
gested that I was probably a rich South American with
very much red Indian blood in my veins. I laughed and,
introducing myself, informed him, speaking Serb with
some difficulty, that I was neither a South American nor
an Indian, but just a Serb student who was a citizen of
the United States. A Serb from the United States was
a very rare bird in those days and, needless to say, I was
invited most cordially to join the group, which I did.
Not one of them reminded me of the alert, well-groomed,
athletic, and playful American college boys. They all
had long hair brushed back in a careless fashion, affecting
the appearance of dreamy poets or disciples of radical
doctrines. Most of them had slouch hats with wide brims,
indicating radical tendencies. Their faces looked pale
and suggested excessive indoor confinement in Vienna
and Budapest cafes, playing chess or cards, or discussing
radical doctrines. Most of them would have been hazed
if they had matriculated in any American college without
modifying much their appearance and manner. They
certainly took themselves very seriously. They knew, I
thought, many things which they had read in books,
principally in books dealing with radical social-science
theories. Tolstoy's name was mentioned quite often,
and the latest apostles of socialistic doctrines also had
their share of adulation. They must have observed that
conversation about these things bored me, and they asked
me, with some display of sarcasm, I thought, whether

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 153

American college students took any interest in modern
advanced thought. ''They do," said I, considerably
irritated, ''and if it were not for Maxwell's new electrical
theory and for other advanced theories in modern physics
I should not have come to your moribund old Europe."
"Advanced thought in social and not in physical
sciences," they said, explaining their original question,
and I answered that the most popular American doctrine
in social science still rested upon foundations laid a hun-
dred years before that time, in a document called the
Declaration of Independence. They knew very little
about it, and I knew even less about their radical social-
science theories, and we changed the subject of our con-
versation.

Late in the afternoon the boat approached Karlovci
and the hills of Frushka Gora. I could not help remi-
niscing, and entertained my Serb acquaintances vvith a
description of my experiences with the theological stu-
dents eleven years before, including the disappearance of
my roast goose. My Serbian vocabulary was quite shaky,
but nevertheless I made quite a hit, and they begged me
to go on with my reminiscences. Whenever I was at a
loss for a word, they helped me out. Toward sunset Bel-
grade hove in sight, and its majestic appearance thrilled
me and made my Serb vocabulary run as smoothly as
ever. I saluted Belgrade as the acropolis of all the Serbs,
and expressed the hope that it might soon become the
metropoUs of all the southern Slavs. "This is the kind
of advanced thought in social and political science that
American students are interested in," I said, reminding
them of their former question, and I added a few sarcastic
remarks about advanced thoughts in social and political
science which are not born in the heart of a nation but
imported from the dens of French, German, and Russian
theorists. They quickly caught what I called the Amer-
ican point of view, but they did not oppose it, for fear, I

154 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

thought, of offending me. They saw the American chip
on my shoulder, and did not care to knock it off.

I had not seen Belgrade since I was a little boy, and
as the boat approached it I saw its high fort rising like a
Gibraltar above the waters of the Danube and looking
anxiously across the endless plains of Austria-Himgary,
which, like wide-open jaws of a hungry dragon, seemed
to threaten to swallow it up. Everything I saw in Aus-
tria-Hungary looked small and shrivelled up, but Bel-
grade looked to me as if its proud head would touch the
stars. The history of the long-suffering Serb race was
grouped around it, and that hfted it up in my imagina-
tion to sublime heights. I was much tempted to stop
there and climb up to the top of Mount Avala, near Bel-
grade, and from there send my greetings to heroic Serbia,
just as I had sent my greetings to heroic Switzerland
from the top of snow-covered Titlis. But I was told to
look sharp if I wished to catch the last local boat to
Panchevo, and so I bade good-by and au revoir to white-
towered Belgrade, as the Serbian guslars call it.

When the local boat arrived in Panchevo a delegation
of young men, including one of the Serb students who
had come with me from Budapest, transferred me to
another boat, which was crowded with what looked like
a gay wedding-party. The singing society of Panchevo
had chartered this boat to take it and its friends to Kar-
lovci, where a great national gathering of Serbs was to
take place on the following day. The earthly remains
of the great Serb poet Branko Radichevich were to arrive
there from Vienna, where, when still a youth, he died
and had been buried thirty years before. His body was
to be transferred to and buried near Karlovci, on Straz-
hilovo hill, which was glorified by his immortal verses.
His lyrics were messages to all Serbs, calling upon them
to nurse their traditions and prepare for their national
reunion. Representative Serbs from all parts of Serbdom

FIKST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 155

were to assemble in Karlovci to escort the earthly re-
mains of the popular poet to his last resting-place. I
was to represent America, hence the invitation to join
the Panchevo delegation. Serb nationalism flamed up in
my heart again.

Our boat arrived at Karlovci in the early hours of the
following morning, and there we found many singing
societies and delegates from Voyvodina, Serbia, Bosnia,
Hercegovina, and Montenegro — a most picturesque gath-
ering of splendid-looking young men and women, many
of them in their national costumes of brilliant colors.
The funeral procession started early in the afternoon.
The singing societies from the principal centres of Serb-
dom, lined up in the march in proper succession, took
up in turn the singing of the solemn and wonderfully
harmonious funeral hymn: ^'Holy God, almighty God,
immortal God, have mercy upon us.'^

The Orthodox church permits no instrumental music.
Those who have had the good fortune to hsten to Russian
choirs know the power and the spiritual charm of their
choral singing. Serb choirs are not their inferiors. No
music appeals to our hearts so strongly as the music of
the human voice. Every one of the singers in that pro-
cession at Karlovci felt that he was paying his last vocal
tribute to the sacred memory of the national poet, and
his voice rose up to the heavens above as if carried there
by the wings of his inspired soul. The effect was irre-
sistible, and there was not a single dry eye in the great
national gathering. A dismembered nation united in
tears was a most solemn and inspiring spectacle. One
could not help feeling that these tears were welcome to
the thirsty soil which nourished the roots of Serb na-
tionalism. A nation which is united in song and in tears
will never lose its unity. If the governments of Vienna
and Budapest had foreseen the emotions which that
solemn ceremony would arouse in the hearts of that vast

156 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

and representative gathering coming from every part of
the dismembered Serbdom, they would never have per-
mitted it. But that would have meant the exercise of
the perceptions of subtle psychology, which these govern-
ments never had.

When the boat returned to Panchevo, Protoyeray
Zhivkovich, the poet-priest, who had first suggested my
transference from Panchevo to Prague, was watching for
my arrival, and received me with tears of joy in his eyes.
He was a protecting friend and adviser of my boyhood
days, and he always considered himself indirectly re-
sponsible for my wandering away to the distant shores
of America. When I thanked him for the choice feast
which he had prepared for me, he assured me that his
feast was only a feast of food, whereas the feast which I
spread out before him when I answered his questions
about America was a feast for his soul. I certainly did
it, if I interpreted correctly the luminous flashes of his
intelligent eyes. He was a man of about sixty, but his
vigorous eye was still just as eloquent as the stirring verses
of his younger days. ^'Tell your mother," he said, ^Hhat
I am happy to bear the whole responsibihty for your
wandering away to distant America. It is no longer
distant; it is now in my heart; you have brought America
to us. It was a new world in my terrestrial geography;
it is now a new world in my spiritual geography." His
generous enthusiasm threatened to undo some of the so-
bering effects of Niven's conference at Cambridge. Dur-
ing my several visits at his house that summer I had to
repeat again and again my description of Beecher and of
his sermons. He called him the brother of Joan of Arc
of the new spiritual world; her flaming sword, he said,
was ^^ Uncle Tom's Cabin."

My older sister and her husband drove to Panchevo
and escorted me to Idvor. ^Tien Idvor's territory was
reached I begged them to make a detour which would

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 157

take me through the pasturelands and vineyards of Idvor,
where I had seen my happiest boyhood days. There, as
if in a dream, I saw the boys of Idvor watching herds of
oxen just as I used to do, and playing the same games
which I used to play. The vineyards, the summer sky
above them, and the river Tamish in the distance, where
I had learned to swim and dive, looked the same as ever.
Presently the famihar church-spire of Idvor hove in sight,
and gradually the sweet sound of the church-bells, an-
nouncing vespers, awakened countless memories in my
mind and I found it difficult to control my emotions.
As we drove slowly through little Idvor everything looked
exactly as it had looked eleven years before. There were
no new houses, and the old ones looked as old as ever.
The people were doing the same work which they always
did during that season of the year, and they were doing
it in the same way. When we reached the village green
I saw the gate of my mother's yard wide open, a sign that
she expected a welcome guest. She sat alone on the bench
under a tree in front of her house, and waited, looking
in the direction from which she expected me to come.
When she saw my sister's team, I observed that suddenly
she raised her white handkerchief to her eyes, and my
sister whispered to me: ^^Mayka plache !'' ('^Mother is
weeping!") I jumped out of the wagon and hastened
to embrace her. Oh, how wonderful is the power of tears,
and how clear is our spiritual vision when a shower of
tears has purified the turbulent atmosphere of our emo-
tions ! ]\Iother's love and love for mother are the sweet-
est messages of God to the living earth.

Everything in Idvor looked the same, but my mother
had changed; she looked much older, and much more
beautiful. There was a saintly fight in her eyes which
disclosed to me the serene firmament of the spiritual
world in which she lived. Raphael and Titian, I thought,
never painted a more beautiful saint. I gazed and wor-

158 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

shipped and felt most humble. ^^Come," she said, ''and
walk with me; we shall be alone; I want to hear your
voice and see the light of your face, undisturbed." We
walked slowly, and my mother recalled many things,
reminding me of the familiar objects of my bbyhood days,
as: ''Here is the path on which you walked to school;
there is the church where you read the epistles on Sun-
days and holidays ; there is the mill with the funnel-shaped
thatched roof from the top of which you once removed
the shining new tin star, imagining that it was a star
from heaven; there is the house where Baba Batikin, of
blessed memory, lived and taught you so many ancient
tales; there is the house where old Aunt Tina cured your
whooping-cough with charms and with herbs steeped in
honey; here Uved old Lyubomir, of blessed memory, who
was so fond of you, and made your sheepskin coats and
caps; here is the field where every evening you brought
our horses to the chikosh (the village herdsman) to take
them to the pasturelands.'^

By that time we had reached the end of the little vil-
lage, but my mother prolonged our leisurely walk and
presently we stood at the gate of the village cemetery.
Pointing to a cross of red marble my mother said that it
marked the grave of my father. When we reached it I
kissed the cross, and, kneeling upon the grave, I prayed.
My mother, loyal to Serb traditions, addressed the grave,
saying: "Kosta, my faithful husband, here is your boy
whom you loved more dearly than your own life, and
whose name was on your lips when you breathed your
last. Accept his prayer and his tears as his affectionate
tribute to your blessed memory, which he will cherish
forever."

On the way back we stopped at the church and kissed
the icons of our patron saint and of St. Sava, and lighted
two wax candles which mother had brought with her.
I confessed to her that I felt as if a sacred communion

FIRST JOURNEY TO mVOR 159

had reunited me with the spirit of Idvor. That was her
wish, she said, because she did not want Idvor to think
that I was like a proud stranger from a proud, strange
land. ^'I did not recognize you," she said, '^when I first
saw you in your sister's wagon until you smiled with the
smile of your boyhood days, and then I shed the sweetest
tears of my Hfe. You looked so learned and so far above
us plain folks of Idvor that nobody will recognize the
Misha they used to know, and whom they long to see,
unless you show them the boy that they used to know."
My promise to return to Idvor ^'rich in learning and aca-
demic honors" was evidently made good, according to
my mother's opinion. But did not this learning and
these academic honors carry with them an air which did
not harmonize with the old-fashioned notions of Idvor?
This, I believed, was in my mother's mind, and I made
a careful note of it.

Idvor came to see me, and it assured me that there
was no youngster in all the great plains of Voyvodina
who was nearer to the heart of his native village than
Misha. This affectionate regard was won by my strict
observance of all the old customs of Idvor, as, for in-
stance, kissing the hand of the old people of Idvor, and
in return being kissed by them on the forehead. On the
other hand, young peasant boys and girls of Idvor kissed
my hand, and I kissed them on the cheek and petted
them. My cousin, much older than I, was an ex-soldier
and a stern Knez (chief) of the village. He was the oldest
male member and, therefore, the head of the Pupins.
I was expected to keep this in mind constantly, and I
did it whenever I stood in his mighty presence. Amer-
ican citizenship eliminated my allegiance to the Emperor
of Austria-Hungary but not to the autocratic Knez of
Idvor. There was another great person in Idvor whose
presence inspired awe. He was my koum (godfather).
My mother had lost all her children that were born in

160 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

her earlier years, and was left childless for many years.
She then bore two daughters when she was over thirty.
I was born when she was over forty, in answer to her
fervent prayer, she firmly believed, that God grant her
a son. A boy born late in life, if he is to live, must, ac-
cording to a popular belief in Idvor, be handed out through
the front window to the first person who comes along,
and that person has to carry the baby to church quickly
and have it baptized. In this manner a very poor and
himible peasant of Idvor became my koum. A koum's
authority over his godchild is, theoretically at least, un-
limited, according to Serbian custom. In practice, a
godchild must eat humble pie when the koum is present.
Between my cousin, who, as Knez, was at the head of
the village, and my koum, who was somewhere near the
bottom of the village, I had some difficulty to steer the
correct course of conduct. I succeeded, thanks to my
efforts to please my mother; and the peasants of Idvor
most cheerfully admitted that America must be a fine
Christian country, since it had given me a training which
harmonized so well with the Christian traditions of Idvor.
My presidency in the junior year at Columbia College,
my undisputed authority among some of the young aris-
tocrats of New York, and the many scholastic successes
in my academic career had sown some seeds of vanity
and false pride in my heart. But these seeds were smoth-
ered by the inexorable rigors of Idvor's traditions. Hu-
mihty is the cardinal virtue in a youth among the peas-
ants of Idvor.

Needless to say, the story of my life since I had left
Idvor was retold many a time, until my mother and my
sisters knew it by heart. It was sweet music to their
ears. I enjoyed it, too, because summer evenings in a
Serbian garden are most conducive to the spinning out
of reminiscent tales. The village worthies spent many
Sunday afternoons in my mother's garden asking many,

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 161

many a question about America. Tales about things
like the Brooklyn Bridge, the elevated railroad, the tall
buildings in New York, and the agricultural operations
of the West were received with many expressions of won-
der, but at times also, I thought, with some reserve. A
simple peasant mind could not accept without consider-
able reserve the statement that a machine can cut, bind,
and load the seasoned wheat, all at the same time, Vv'ith
nothing but a few stupid horses to drag it along. After
a while my store of information became exhausted, and
I had much less to say, but the wise men of Idvor urged
me to go on. They met my apologies with the statement
that peasant Ghiga had never left Idvor in all his life
until one day he went to a neighboring village, about
ten miles away, and saw the county fair. He returned
to Idvor on the same day, and for six weeks he never
ceased talking about the great things which he had seen
at that county fair. '^Just imagine," said the priest,
^'how much he would have had to say if he had been
nine years in great America!"

I was overwhelmed with invitations to attend concerts
and festivals in many places of my native Banat, and
when I attended I was often called upon to say something
about America, and, of course, I spoke about my favorite
subject: ^'The American Doctrine of Freedom." People
talked and papers wrote about it. One day the Fehispan,
the governor of Torontal, where Idvor belonged under
the new division of Hungary, sent for me, and appointed
the hour for a conference. I went, carrying my American
citizenship papers and my Columbia diploma in my
pocket. When I entered his office I saw a handsome
young man of about thirty, quite athletic in appearance,
and looking like an English aristocrat in dress and in
manner. I was told beforehand that he was a young
Hungarian nobleman v/ho prided himself upon his Eng-
lish university training. I wondered how he would act

162 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

when he saw before him a Serb youth from the peasant
village of Idvor who prided himself upon his American
college training. He looked puzzled when I entered and
saluted him with a Serbian ^'Dobroytro gospodine!''
(''Good morning, sir")? accompanying my salute with an
Anglo-Saxon bow, that is a jerky motion of the head
from the shoulders up. The bow of continental Europe
is much more elaborate. After some hesitation he asked
me to sit down, and then, as if by an afterthought, he
brought a chair himself and offered it to me. We spoke
in English, since I did not understand Hungarian, and
he did not care to speak Serb. By way of introduction
I showed him my American citizenship papers and my
diploma, and he remarked that these documents agreed
with my appearance and manner, adding quickly that he
meant a complunent. He asked me how I liked Idvor
and Hungary. Then I told him that I never had known
much about Hungary, but that Budapest and even its
famous bridge looked to me small and shrivelled up, prob-
ably because I compared things there with things in New
York. ''It is big enough, is it not, to be the metropolis
of the southern Slavs in Hungary?" he asked. "It un-
doubtedly is," said I, "but somewhat inconvenient and
unnatural." I volunteered this opinion, seeing from his
somewhat inquisitorial manner that he knew much about
my doings, and that he had heard of my salute to Bel-
grade when my boat from Budapest approached it a
month earlier.

"This, I suppose, is the doctrine which you preached
at Karlovci, at the national gathering there?" asked the
handsome and genial inquisitor, and I answered: "No;
I had no time; I was too busy carrying the body of the
great poet to Strazhilovo. Besides, the Karlovci cere-
mony itself was really a grand sermon which glorified
that doctrine, and some day it may prevail, when the
slow mind of the southern Slav wakes up and does the

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 163

natural thing." ''The quick mind of the Hungarian
crown may wake up sooner and do the natural thing,"
said the young Fehispan, and added: ''What you say
now confirms my information that in your public ut-
terances you deny the divine right of the crown and pro-
claim the divine right of the people." "That is one of
the messages of our American Declaration of Indepen-
dence," said I, "and I delivered that message to people
here who were anxious to hear something about Am^erica."
Then I added that Kossuth, while in America, was glori-
fjdng the divine right of the Hungarian people and deny-
ing the divine right of the Hapsburg crown in Hungary.
I had heard this and many other Hungarian democratic
doctrines from Henry Ward Beecher, who was a great
friend and admirer of Kossuth, and I told him that. He
saw that my trigger was ready if he attempted any fur-
ther moves in this direction. "You are certainly frank
and honest, like all real Americans that I know; that
makes them most attractive. But why don't you natu-
ralized Americans mind your own business when you
visit us?" He was much less stern and serious when he
said this, and I was only too glad to play a more cheerful
tune, and said: "Our most important business here is
our mission to make you, our poor relations here, happy
and prosperous by having you adopt the American point
of view."

He was a wealthy Hungarian magnate w^ho owned
several villages, each of them bigger than Idvor, and
this answer coming from a son of poor Idvor amused
him much. From that moment on our conference was
much less formal, and became even cordial when he of-
fered me coffee and cigarettes. I jokingly told him that
Magyarism and Teutonism had driven me away from
Panchevo and Prague, and now that I was back for a
visit I wished to pay them back with a little present of
a few American ideas. "Your American ideas," he re-

164 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

torted jokingly, ^Svill make you even less popular here
than your Serb nationalism did eleven years ago. Drop
them while you are here. You'll have more fun shooting
wild ducks in the lowlands of the Tamish River near
Idvor than clearing up to dullards the American point
of viev/. The duck season is on, and it is a pity to miss
a single day. I'll lend you an American gun which is
just right for that sort of business." He did, and that
gun kept me busy and saved him the trouble of watching
my movements. The village notary accompanied me on
my shooting tramps; he v/as an expert fisherman and
shot, and spared no pains to please me and — the Fehispan.
A two weeks' tramp in the marshes of the Tamish River,
chasing the elusive duck, diminished my haste to har-
monize the political point of view of the Serbs in the Voy-
vodina with American ideas.

When the vintage was over, toward the end of Sep-
tember. I made ready to start for Cambridge. I was
sorry to leave, because the merry season in Voyvodina
is on when the vintage is over and the new wine has ceased
fermenting. The golden crops are then all in, and the
lazy pigs are fat and round, and ready to be served at
wedding-feasts. In other lands it is the springtime when
the young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love; in the
Serb Voyvodina it is the autumn season which has that
mysterious power. It is in the autunrn when marriage-
bells never cease ringing, and the bagpipes with the merry
songs of wedding-feasts stir up the hearts from one end
of the Banat plains to the other. But my mother diverted
my attention to more serious thoughts, and she assured
me that she was even more happy preparing me for my
journey to Cambridge than she was when, eleven years
before, she was preparing me for my journey to Prague.

A few days prior to my departure the village worthies
prepared a fish-supper in my honor. The Tamish fisher-
men cooked it in their traditional way over a wood fire

FIRST JOURNEY TO IDVOR 165

burning under the open sky. The httle supper-party
reached the fishermen's hut on the bank of the Tarnish
River just about sunset. The western sky was all aglow
iviih the golden light of the parting day, and so was the
surface of the tranquil Tarnish Reiver, made luminous by
the image of the western sky. The rest of the landscape
looked dark by contrast, excepting the glowing faces of
the patient supper-party, who sat around the busy fires
and watched the boiling kettles and the broiling pans.
At some distance, and standing at the very end of a fisher-
man's barge, was the dark silhouette of a tall young
shepherd, v/ho stood there lonely like some solitary dark
spectre hovering over the golden surface of the Taoiish
River. It was just the spot for one who sought seclusion
and longed for quiet meditation. No ripple in the water
or in the air disturbed his dreams, if he had any, and I
thought that he had. His sheep had been watered, and
he had finished his frugal supper long ago, before the
light of the day had retired below the distant horizon
line of the Banat plains. The silence of the approaching
night awakened emotions which only his tuneful flute
could e>cpress, and suddenly he poured his soul into a
melody which surely was not addressed to mere phan-
toms of the vacuous space. I felt that the quivering air
was conveying through the evening silence a message of
love to some maiden, who was perhaps just then spin-
ning under some thatched roof of drowsy Idvor and think-
ing of him. The priest approached me to tell me that
the fish way ready and that the feast would soon begin.
I told hmi that my feast had already begun and called
his attention to the heavenly melody. He said: ^'Oh,
that's Gabriel, the son of my neighbor Milutin. He en-
tered the village school when you left Idvor, and he fin-
ished it long ago. He will be married on St. Michael's
day, and what you hear now is his sefdalia (song of sighs)
for his future bride, who is over there in our drowsy vil-

166 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

lage/^ When he jokingly suggested that I might be look-
ing forward to the enjoyment of the sweets of simple
pastoral Hfe which were in store for Gabriel, if I had not
tm-ned my back on Idvor eleven years before, I answered
that perhaps it was not too late to correct the error. The
priest looked astonished, and asked me whether I had
crossed and recrossed the Atlantic in order to become a
shepherd of Idvor. I said nothing, but I knew that Ga-
briel's melody had disclosed to me another world in which
the question ''What is Light ?'^ is by no means the most
important question. There were other great questions
of human hfe, the answers to which can perhaps be found
in Idvor without a knowledge of Maxwell's electrical
theory.

VI

STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

A LONG-coNTrNUED struggle with no let-up will wreck
a feeble constitution. It produces in a strong and healthy
constitution a tuning-up of continuously rising pitch
under the tension of which even the strongest constitution
may snap in two. My struggle had been going on for
nine years when I was returning to Europe on my way
to Idvor, hence my pitch was very high. Nervous tension
resulting in a lack of poise was the diagnosis of my ail-
ment, according to my English friend in Lucerne, who
urged me to abandon the exploration of the beauties of
the Alps and seek the solitude of my native village; other-
wise, he said, not even all the guardian angels in heaven
could prevent me from breaking my neck. A two months^
vacation in the soporific atmosphere of Idvor was a bless-
ing; my pitch was lowered through several octaves, and
I did not vibrate violently in response to every impulse
that came along. I recognized, for instance, that the
Serbs of the Voyvodina could wait a little longer for their
poHtical salvation, which I confidently expected from
their adoption of the American point of view. I also
recognized that to many human beings a knowledge of
the modern theories of physics was not indispensable
to happiness. There was not a single person in Idvor
who cared two straws about these things, and yet most
of these good people were happy, as, for instance, Gabriel,
who was to be married on St. Michael's day. Gabriel did
not know much, I said to myself, but the little knowledge
he had was very definite. He knew that he loved the
girl he was about to marry, a-nd he also knew that his life,

167

168 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

following in the footsteps of his peasant ancestors, had a
definite object in view which, as everybody in his village
knew, was easily attainable. I knew more than Gabriel
did, but my knowledge was not as definite as his. My ami
in life was, I thought, much higher than his; but was it
attainable ? And, if attainable, was it worth the struggle ?
Two months earlier such a question could not have oc-
curred to me even in a dream. But Gabriel's melody
and the dreamy atmosphere of Idvor suggested it.

My mother observed that a change had occurred, but
she was not alarmed. I spoke less often of my future
plans, and was less anxious about my departure for Cam-
bridge. The wedding celebrations in my native Banat
were already ushered in by the gay autumn season, and
the beautiful kolo dancers, whirling around the merry
bagpipes, engaged my interest much more than when I
had come to Idvor two months before. One evening my
mother recalled an incident which happened in my early
boyhood days and which I remembered well. She said
something like this:

''Do you remember when Bukovala's mill with its
high conical roof was rethatched?'' I said, ''Yes," and
she continued: "You were then a httle shaver, but you
certainly remember still the shining tin star which the
workmen had planted upon the top of the conical roof
after they had finished their work of thatching. The
children of Idvor thought that it was a real star from
heaven; it looked so bright when the sunlight was shin-
ing upon it. One day the tm star disappeared, and every-
body wondered how anybody could have climbed up
that smooth and steep roof and taken the star away.
Old Lyubomir, who loved you so dearly and deUghted
in making sheepskin coats for you, was sure that it was
you, and he suggested that special prayers of thanks-
giving be read in church for your miraculous escape. Old
Lyubomir was right, as you know, and I always believed

STUDIES AT CAIMBRIDGE 169

that God had saved you for a mission in Ufe much higher
than that of young Gabriel, whose happy lot you seem to
envy. Blessed America has taught you how to climb a
roof much steeper than that of Bukovala's mill, and on
its top and all the way up to it you will find many a real
star from heaven. You are not far from the top and you
cannot stop nor turn back now any more than you could
when you saw the peak of Titlis in the distance, but felt
too fatigued to finish your climb. Gabriel's magic flute
and his mellow sefdalia, song of sighs, have turned your
thoughts to things which are now in everybody's mind:
to wedding-feasts and kolo dancing, and to other diver-
sions which fill the hearts of Idvor's youth during this
merry autumn season. You are dreaming now some of
the idle dreams of youth, but when you return to Cam-
bridge you will wake up again and see that all this was
a pleasant dream only, which you saw in your restful
hours in drowsy Idvor. The real things are waiting for
you at Cambridge.'^

I confessed my weakness and pleaded extenuating
circumstances. I tried to persuade her that her tender
affection and watchful ministering to what she insisted
should be my pleasures and comforts during that sum-
mer had transformed a hardy youth into a soft and pam-
pered pet. She answered: ''The blacksmith softens his
steel before he forges it into a chain; you are just right
for the blacksmiths of Cambridge."

When I returned to Cambridge from drowsy little Idvor
things looked different from what they had on my former
visit two months before. Things which, in my feverish
haste, I had scarcely noticed then filled me now with awe.
The ancient college buildings inspired a feeling of wonder
and of veneration. I saw in them just so many monu-
mental records of the ancient traditions of English learn-
ing. I began to understand, I thought, how it hap-

170 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

pened that a little nation on a little island in the northern
Atlantic became the leader in the world's empire of in-
tellect, and the cradle of a great civihzation. This first
impression made upon me by these ancient monmnents
was greatly amplified as soon as I caught even the first
glimpses of the daily activity of Cambridge. The fore-
noons appeared serious and sombre to an outside ob-
server; everybody wore a black cap and gown and every-
body did apparently the same thing, going somewhere
in search of sources of learning and inspiration. The
intellect of Cambridge seemed to be in full action during
the forenoons, and hence the solemn seriousness of the
university town during the early half of the day. But
the scene changed as if by magic when the midday had
passed. The black caps and gowns disappeared, and in
their places white flannel trousers and gaily colored blazers
and caps adorned the college youths and many college
dons. The same youths who in the forenoon, like sombre
monks, were making a pilgrimage to some miracle-work-
ing fountains of wisdom joined in a gay procession in the
afternoon, hastening to the sparkling fountains of athletic
recreation. The intellectual activity of the forenoon was
succeeded by the physical activity of Cambridge in the
afternoon. To a stranger like myself, who knew prac-
tically nothing of the famous university town, the change
of scene between morning and afternoon was bewildering.
It looked to me as if I saw a monastic-looking procession
of serious and thoughtful men suddenly changed into gay
groups of lively youths whose only thoughts were on the
games which awaited them. By counting the different
colors of blazers and caps and the coats of arms which
adorned the athletic youths one could easily count the
number of different colleges in the old university. These
colors and coats of arms had a meaning, I thought, and
I asked myself whether they did not, like the ancient
college buildings, record the ancient traditions of the

STUDIES AT CAIVIBRIDGE 171

venerable seat of learning. They certainly did; they were
a part of the symboUc language which told the story of
the university's customs and traditions. It was clear to
me that while at Cambridge my work was to be done in
the morning and evening, and my playing in the after-
noon, in accordance with the local customs. I stayed
at a hotel for several days and watched these external
pictures of Cambridge life before I called on Mr. Niven
of Trinity and on Mr. Oscar Browning of King's. I wished
to get some picture of the daily activities at Cambridge
before I presented myseK to these learned men, and I got
it.

Niven was expecting me and was ready with a pro-
gramme of work which he had promised me in June, and
I gladly accepted it. Both Niven and Browning assured
me that at that late date lodgings in any college were
out of the question, and that I must get lodgings in the
town for one academic year at least. It did not matter,
because very many students resided outside of the col-
lege buildings. I really preferred it, because I had not
come to Cambridge to seek the opportunities offered by
its college life; I had come to study physics and find out
how Maxwell answered the question ^^What is Light?"
That was the only definite point in the programme which
I had brought to Cambridge; the rest was hazy and re-
minded me often of a Serbian figure of speech which
speaks of a goose groping around in a fog to find its
way. But I had groped like a goose in a fog when I
landed at Castle Garden and finally found my way. The
saying, ''Where there's a will there's a way," comforted
me much.

My residence in lodgings outside of the college pre-
cincts had one great advantage. It gave me an oppor-
tunity to study English life from what I considered a
somewhat novel point of view. It is the point of view
which discloses to the foreigner English domestic Ufe

172 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

through the unique personaHty of the Enghsh landlady.
During my eighteen months' stay at the University of
Cambridge, I had an opportunity to study her wonderful
ways, not only in Cambridge, but also in London, Hast-
ings, Brighton, and Folkestone, where I used to spend
my Easter and Christmas vacations. She was the same
everywhere: dignified, reticent, punctual, and square;
neat and clean in all her ways; willing and anxious to
render service, but not a servant; possessing a perfect
understanding of her own business, which she minded
scrupulously, but avoiding carefully minding anybody
else's business.

At Mr. Browning's request a Mr. Ling, the leading
tenor of King's College chou*, took me around to look
for lodgings. He belonged to the town and not to the
gown, and was quite anxious to impress me with the many
virtues of the town. He transformed our trip into an
elaborate inspection tour of the student lodgings, because
he was proud of them and considered them a very essen-
tial part of the great university. At that time I thought
that he, a very enthusiastic townsman, was perhaps exag-
gerating the importance of this subsidiary instrumentality
of the university. But when I got to know the Cambridge
landlady and to understand her importance, I became
convinced that Mr. Ling was right. I had not been in
Cambridge more than a week before I learned the funda-
mentals of English domestic life, and I admired its whole-
some simphcity. My landlady taught me these funda-
mentals, and in her wonderfully tactful ways she enforced
their operation without my being aware that I was led
around by her intelligent and forceful hand. I take off
my hat to the EngUsh landlady, who, in her humble and
unostentatious ways, is one of the eloquent interpreters
of Anglo-Saxon civiUzation. She was one of my trusty
guides and sympathetic assistants during my strenuous
eighteen months at the University of Cambridge.

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 173

I started my work at Cambridge unattached to any
college. But later I made up my mind to attach myself
to King's College, yielding to repeated suggestions from
my friend, Mr. Oscar Browning. But I did not change
my lodgings. King's had less than a hundred students
and many dons. Not one of them was a star in physics,
and therefore the college had no attractions for me on
account of the learning of its dons. But it had a beauti-
ful chapel and a famous choir. The stained-glass windows
of Iving's College chapel were famous as far back as Crom-
well's time and they are still so. Every time I attended
service in this glorious chapel I went away feeling spir-
itually uphfted. I attended regularly, although, as a
member of the Orthodox faith, I was excused from all
religious services. What the other students, belonging
to the established church, considered a stern duty, I con-
sidered a rare privilege. The chapel gave me a spiritual
tonic whenever I needed it, and I needed it often. I
yielded also to Mr. Browning's suggestions to try for a
place in the college boat, and succeeded. Rowing was
the only exercise which I took at Cambridge after I had
become attached to King's, but before that I took long
walks, usually with one of the younger dons or with a
student who was engaged in the same book work in which
I was engaged. They helped me to make myself familiar
with the history of Cambridge and of the surrounding
country. Everybody in Cambridge took his daily exer-
cise just as regularly as he took his daily bath and food.
I followed the universal custom; it suited me well and,
besides, that was the best way to get along in Cambridge.

Physical as well as intellectual activity of the students
at Cambridge was a matter of daily routine, regulated
by customs and traditions. But these regulators were
different for different groups of students. The student
studying for honors arranged his work differently from
the arrangement which suited the needs of a Poll student,

174 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

that is, the ordinary student who did not aspire to academic
honors. Their previous training also had been different.
The students who aspired to academic honors in mathe-
matics were quite numerous, more numerous than the stu-
dents in any other honor class. Cambridge, ever since the
time of Newton, had become the nursery of the mathemati-
cal sciences in the British Empire. There were about five
of these honor groups at Cambridge in those days. Niven
advised me to join the honor group in mathematics, the
so-called mathematical tripos group, and he picked out
a coach for me. Just as one straight line, only, can be
drawn through two points, so the line of the student's
intellectual activity at Cambridge was fixed when he had
picked out the honor class and the tutor or coach to train
him for the examinations prescribed for that honor class.
To join the honor class in mathematics meant to work
alongside of students who expected to become Cambridge
wranglers. To understand the meaning of this it suffices
to know that no greater honor was in store for the am-
bitious youths in the university than to be a senior wran-
gler or to stroke a victorious varsity boat. The prep-
arations for these glorious honors were just as careful
as the preparations of a Grecian youth for participation
in the Olympian games. I had no ambition to become a
Cambridge wrangler, but Niven pointed out that a pro-
spective physicist who wished to master some day Max-
well's new electrical theory must first master a good part
of the mathematical work prescribed for students prepar-
ing for the Cambridge mathematical tripos examinations.
** Doctor Routh could fix you up in quicker time than
anybody," said Niven with a smile, and then he added
cautiously, "that is, if Routh consents to your joining
his private classes, and if you can manage to keep up the
pace of the youngsters who are under his training." Three
months before, when I first called on Niven, and when
my pitch was very high, I would have resented this; but

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 175

Idvor had lowered my pitch several octaves and I swal-
lowed Niven's bitter pill without the slightest sign of
mental distress. My humihty pleased him, because it
probably reheved him of some anxiety about the question
of managing me.

John Edward Routh, fellow of Peterhouse College, was
the most famous mathematical coach that Cambridge
University had ever seen. In his lifetime he had coached
several hundred wranglers, and for twenty-two consec-
utive years he had coached the senior wrangler of each
year. This is really equivalent to saying that a certain
jockey had ridden the Derby winner for twenty- two con-
secutive years. He was a senior wrangler himself in 1854,
when great James Clerk Maxwell was second wrangler,
and he divided with Maxwell the famous Smith's prize
in mathematics. To be admitted by Routh into his pri-
vate classes was flattering, according to Niven, but to be
able to keep up with them would be a most encouraging
sign. Niven was anxiously waiting for that sign. Routh
accepted me, but gave me to understand that my mathe-
matical preparation was much below the standard of the
boys who came to Cambridge to prepare for the mathe-
matical tripos examinations, and that I should have to
do considerable extra reading. He also cautioned me
that all this meant very stiff work for a good part of the
academic year. I went to Cambridge to study physics
and not mathematics; but, according to Niven and
Routh, my real desire, as far as they could make it out,
was to study mathematical physics, and they assured me
that my training with Routh, if I could keep the pace,
would soon lay a good foundation for that. Lord Ray-
leigh lectured on mathematical physics and so did famous
Professor Stokes (later Sir George Gabriel Stokes); but
according to Routh and Niven I was not prepared to
attend any of these lectures, and much less to read
Maxwell's famous mathematical treatise on his new

176 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

electrical theory. Niven reminded me once of my first
visit to Cambridge, when I had insisted that Cambridge
without Maxwell had no attractions for me, and he asked
me, jokingly, whether Lord Rayleigh's lectures were good
enough for me. I answered that they certainly were, but
that, unfortunately, I was not good enough for the lec-
tures. ^^Next year you will be," said Niven, consoling
me; and I, unable to suppress my feeling of disappoint-
ment, answered: "Let us pray that the starving jackass
does not drop dead before the grass is green again. '^
"What's that?" asked Niven, somewhat puzzled. "That
is a free translation of a Serbian proverb, and I am the
jackass," said I, and refused to furnish any further ex-
planations. But Niven figured it out correctly in the
course of the evening and then laughed heartily. He
confessed that Serbo-American humor was somewhat
involved and required considerable analysis.

The Cambridge colleges, some nineteen in number,
resembled our American colleges in many ways. The
career of the Cambridge Poll men was essentially the
same as that of our American college boys. But our Amer-
ican colleges had no class of students corresponding to
the Cambridge honor men. Referring particularly to the
honor men who prepared for the so-called mathematical
tripos, they came to Cambridge after graduating at some
college outside of Cambridge. For instance, Maxwell
came to Cambridge from the University of Edinburgh,
and Routh came there from the University College, Lon-
don. Both of them migrated to Cambridge, because
their teachers in mathematics, like illustrious De Morgan,
the first mathematical teacher of Routh, were mathe-
maticians of distinction, and discovering in their young
pupils extraordinary mathematical talents they developed
them as far as they could, and then sent them to Cam-
bridge for further development under the training of
famous coaches who prepared them for the mathematical

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 177

tripos. These teachers were usually former Cambridge
wranglers, apostles of the Cambridge mathematical school,
and they were always on the lookout for a fresh supply of
mathematical genius for the nursery which regarded great
Newton as its founder. This was the type of boys which
I met in Routh's classes. They did not seem to know
as much of Greek and Latin, of history and economics,
of literature and physical sciences, as I did, but their
training in mathematics was far superior to mine. They
were candidates for the mathematical tripos, and no
American college of those days had a curriculum which
could turn out candidates with the preliminary mathe-
matical training which those boys brought to Cambridge.
Routh had warned me that stiff work was before me
for a good part of a whole academic year, if I was to keep
up with the young mathematical athletes whom he was
training, and he was right. I experienced many moments
of despondency and even despair, and I needed all the
tonic which King's College chapel could give me; I needed
it very often, and I got it. Routh was a splendid drill-
master even for those students who, like myself, had no
tripos aspirations. He certainly was a wonder, and every-
thing he did was done with ease and grace and in such
an offhand manner that I often thought that he con-
sidered even the stiffest mathematical problems mere
amusing tricks. Problems over which I had puzzled in
vain for many hours he would resolve in several seconds.
He was a virtuoso in the mathematical technique, and he
prepared virtuosos; he was the great master who trained
future senior wranglers. I never felt so small and so hum-
ble as I did during the early period of my training with
Routh. Vanity and false pride had no place in my heart
when I watched Routh demolish one intricate djmamical
problem after another with marvellous ease. I felt as a
commonplace artist feels when he listens to a Paderewski
or to a Fritz Kreisler.

178 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Long before the end of the academic year, I finished
Routh^s preliminary tripos course in dynamics and much
of the auxihary mathematics demanded by it, and be-
came quite skilled in solving dynamical problems. I had
much difficulty in keeping pace with Routh's classes, but
I succeeded, and Niven was pleased. But I was not
pleased ; I did not think that I had found there what I had
expected to find. In the course of time I discovered that
I was not alone in my opinion; many Cambridge men
failed to find in tripos drills the stimulating elements of
that scientific spirit which leads to original research. I
was a goose which groped around in a fog when I came
to Cambridge; but, if I had come from an English col-
lege as a promising tripos candidate, with my work cut
out for me by my superiors and in accordance with old
customs and traditions of Cambridge, I should not have
discovered that there was in Cambridge at that time an
epoch-making movement, the significance of which can-
not be overestimated. I shall return to this point later.

Many a time during my early experiences in Routh's
drill school I thought of my mother's words which de-
scribed the steep and slippery climb which awaited me, and
which was leading, as she had expressed it, to real stars
from heaven. I felt the steepness of the chmb, but I
saw no star ahead of me. Routh was a great master of
the mathematical technique, but he was not a creative
genius; he was a virtuoso but not a composer. His prin-
cipal concern was to drill his students in the art of solving
those conventional problems which usually formed part
of tripos examinations. The poetical element of dy-
namics, which thrills, was absent from his businesslike
drills. The only star, I thought, which his students saw
ahead of them was a high place in the tripos examina-
tions, and that star did not attract me; recalling my
mother's story, I called it a tin star. I loved Routh
and admired him much, but I did not admire the Cam-

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 179

bridge tripos method of laying a foundation for mathe-
matical physics. WTien Niven discovered my state of
mind he sympathized, and he gave me a little book
called '^Matter and Motion" by Maxwell, a very small
book written by a very great author. ''You are not up
to the mathematics of Maxwell's great electrical treatise,"
said Niven, as he handed me the little book, ''but you
will find no difficulties of that kind in this little book,
which covers a very great subject." It was first published
in America in the Van Nostrand Magazine, No magazine
ever performed a greater educational service. There was
not only much poetical beauty and philosophical depth
in this tiny and apparently most elementary book on
dynamics, but there were also many illustrations of the
close connection between this fundamental science and
other departments of physical science. Maxwell's presen-
tation roused, and it also stimulated, the spirit of inquiry.
Routh's elaborate system of clever tripos problems in
dynamics appeared to me for the first time as Httle parts,
only, of a complex and endless art which had grown out
of a simple and beautiful science, the science of dynamics,
which first saw the fight of day at Trinity CoUege, Cam-
bridge. The exquisite art as practised by Routh and
the subtle science as described by Maxwell, the two lead-
ing Cambridge wranglers of 1854, disclosed to me the
real meaning of Newton, the greatest among the great
Cambridge men, the creator of the science of dynamics.
I knew then that I had seen one of the real stars of heaven
of which my mother spoke. But without the light of
Maxwell I would not have seen the light of Newton. It
wiU be seen further below that Maxwell and Routh, Cam-
bridge wranglers of 1854, were the representatives of
different mental attitudes in Cambridge: Maxwell was
the apostle of the new and Routh of the old spirit of Cam-
bridge. Niven was very fond of reminding me of my first
visit when I had told him that Cambridge without Max-

180 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

well had no attraction for me. After reading Maxwell's
little classic I told Niven that my opinion was, after all,
not so funny and strange as he represented it.

A short digression is timely now. I went to Trinity
College occasionally to spend a Sunday evening with
Mr. Niven. One Sunday evening I walked around the
historical Trinity quadrangle, waiting until Mr. Niven
returned to his rooms from the evening service in the
college chapel. The mysterious-looking light streaming
through the stained-glass windows of the chapel and the
heavenly music radiating from the invisible choir and
organ commanded my attention. I stood motionless like
a solitary spectre in the middle of the deserted and sombre
quadrangle, and gazed, and listened, and dreamed. Yes,
I dreamed of great Newton, the greatest of all Trinity
dons; and I saw how, two centuries before, he w^as tread-
ing over the same spot where I was standing whenever
he was returning from a Sunday evening service in the
very chapel at which I was gazing. I dreamed also of
Maxwell, another great Trinity don; and remembered that,
five years before, the very same choir and organ to which
I was listening had paid their last tribute to this great
Cambridge man, when his earthly remains left the grief-
stricken university on their last pilgrimage to Maxwell's
native Scotland. But I knew that his spirit had remained
at Cam.bridge to inspire forever the coming generations
of ambitious students.

I dreamed of other great Trinity College men whose
spirits seemed to hover about the sombre quadrangle,
rejoicing in the heavenly light and sound which radiated
from the historical chapel where Newton and Maxwell
worshipped in days gone by. I longed for the day when
my alma mater, Columbia College, and other colleges in
America, could offer such an inspiring scene to its students;
and I wondered how soon that day would come. Niven

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 181

told me the following story which, he thought, might
answ^er this question:

A don of Magdalen College, Oxford, was asked by an
American friend how long it would take to raise, in Amer-
ica, a lawn like the famous lawn of Magdalen College.
''I do not know," said the don, ^^but it took us over two
centuries to do it here in Oxford." Niven implied, of
course, that it will take much more than two centuries
to create at any American college that atmosphere which
surrounded me at the Trinity College quadrangle on that
memorable Sunday evening. It was the mysterious charm
of that atmosphere which held me chained to Cambridge
in spite of the fact that I did not believe that the
Cambridge tripos method of laying a foundation in
mathematical physics was fitting my particular case.

Students shift from university to university in con-
tinental Europe, migrating to places where they are at-
tracted by the reputations of teachers who happen to be
there. I went to Cambridge because I thought that Max-
well was there. But at Cambridge, and at Oxford too, it
was not only the teacher who was there but also the
teachers w^ho had Uved there during generations long
past who determined the choice made by ambitious
students. The great teachers in the mathematical sciences
when I was there were Lord Rayleigh, the successor of
Maxwell; John Crouch Adams, who, with Leverrier in
France, shared in the great distinction of calculating
from the perturbations in the orbit of Uranus the posi-
tion of the still unknown planet Neptune; George Gabriel
Stokes, the greatest mathematical physicist in Europe
at that time, and the occupant of the professorial chair
once held by great Newton. But that which brought
the students in mathematical sciences to Cambridge w^as
not only the lustre of the reputations of these great pro-
fessors, but also the existence at Cambridge of a historical
educational policy, to the development of which many

182 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

great Cambridge mathematicians of generations long past
had made lasting contributions. The mathematical tripos
was the most concrete expression of this traditional policy.

It can be inferred from what I have already said that
this traditional policy did not suit me. I do not think
that it would have suited any American student of those
days who had a taste for physics. I said once to a Cam-
bridge friend that my landlady, Routh, and rowing shaped
the daily events of my life. He saw my point and ad-
mitted that each one of them represented ^ powerful
determining factor in the life of a Cambridge student
who was preparing for the mathematical tripos examina-
tions. Each one of them had its deep roots in ancient
traditions from which it was difficult to deviate. Routh
was a rare product and a loyal apostle of the tradition
called the Mathematical Tripos. It was perhaps the most
powerful of all Cambridge traditions and stood as im-
movable as the rock of Gibraltar; its great strength was
the fact that it had produced many distinguished men of
science. But nevertheless some of the greatest hving
Cambridge physicists of those days felt that it had defects
and called for remedies. It was claimed that its method,
having no direct connection with the nascent problems
of scientific research, was artificial and unproductive.

Sir William Thomson, known later as Lord Kelvin,
was among the first who called for speedy remedies. He
was the second wrangler in 1845 and Stephen Parkinson
was the senior wrangler. Thomson left Cambridge and
went to Paris to get from the famous physicist Regnault
what he could not get at Cambridge. After a year, when
only twenty-two years old, he accepted a professorship
in physics and directorship in physical research at the
University of Glasgow. The long-headed Scotch were
fully thirty years ahead of Cambridge in establishing a
research laboratory in physics. Here Thomson worked
out the scientific elements of the first Atlantic cable, and

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 183

invented the instruments necessary for its operation.
When I was in Cambridge the name of Thomson was
attached to most measuring instruments employed in
the electrical industries at that time, and he was also
one of the leaders of abstract scientific thought. He
represented in the popular mind the new spirit of Cam-
bridge. Stephen Parkinson, Thomson's superior in the
tripos test of 1845, was still in Cambridge when I was
there, and had to his credit a text-book on geometrical
optics, with stereotyped problems, suitable for tripos
examinations. He was not among those who called for
a change in the traditional mathematical tripos examina-
tions at Cambridge. Maxwell, undoubtedly inspired by
Thomson, was one of the earliest leaders of the Cam-
bridge movement which demanded a modification of the
mathematical tripos, favoring more the spirit of research
and less the art of solving cleverly formulated mathemati-
cal problems. The Cavendish Physics Laboratory, organ-
ized by Maxwell and first opened in 1874, was, according
to Niven, a concrete expression of this movement.

A similar movement was taking place in the United
States in those days. Among its leaders were President
Barnard of Columbia College, and Joseph Henry, the
first and the most distinguished secretary of the Smith-
sonian Institution. The date of the foundation of Johns
Hopkins University falls within the early period of this
movement. Niven told me that what Maxwell had been
doing in the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge was
being done also by Maxwell's friend, Professor Rowland,
at Johns Hopkins, founded in Baltimore in 1876. ]\Iax-
well thought very highly of his young American friend,
and undoubtedly recommended him strongly for the
physics professorship at Johns Hopkins. Just as the
establishment of the Cavendish Physics Laboratory in
Cambridge marks the beginning of a great epoch in the
development of physics in Cambridge and in Great Brit-

184 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ain, so the organization of the physics laboratory at Johns
Hopkins by Rowland marks a new and most fruitful era
of scientific research in the United States. Rowland's
influence had not yet been felt at Columbia College when
I was a student there, nor at many other American col-
leges of those days. But the forward movement soon
commenced; and the people of this country do not under-
stand yet as fully as they should how much they owe
to the late Henry Augustus Rowland, whom I had the
honor of knowing personally and whose friendship I en-
joyed for several years. One of the aims of this simple
narrative is to throw more hght upon some obscure spots
of this kind which need more illumination, and partic-
ularly upon the work of men like '^Rowland of Troy,
the doughty knight," as Maxwell referred to him in his
verses.

Another historical fact must be mentioned here which
is very characteristic of the state of the science of physics
in those days, and which is closely connected with the
progress of this science as it appeared to me in the course
of the last forty years. I mention now another great
American physicist whose name, like that of Rowland,
I first heard mentioned at Cambridge at that time, and
that was Professor Josiah Willard Gibbs, of Yale. I know
that many of my young colleagues will find it strange
that I never had heard of Lord Rayleigh, of England,
before I graduated at Columbia. ^Vhat will they say
when they hear that at that time I never had heard of
famous Willard Gibbs, of Yale, New Haven, U. S. A.?
Will they charge me with extraordinary ignorance, for
which Columbia of those days was to blame ? That would
be unjust, as the following story will prove. One eve-
ning, after dinner, I was enjoying at the University Club,
New York, the company of some twelve Yale graduates,
and one of them was the learned Professor William Welch,
dean of the Johns Hopkins Medical School. He was then

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 185

president of the National Academy of Sciences. Most
of my Yale friends present were of about my age or even
older. I offered to wager that the majority of them would
fail to give the name of the scientist who, in Doctor
Welch's opinion and in mine, was the greatest scientist
that Yale had ever graduated. Not one of them men-
tioned Willard Gibbs. When I mentioned his name they
frankly confessed that they had never heard of him be-
fore. Neither they nor Yale College of those days were
to blame. Did my fellow students at Cambridge, who
were training for the mathematical tripos, ever hear of
him before they came to Cambridge? If they did, it
was by accident, just as I heard of him by accident. Such
was the spirit of the times in those days; and it was against
this spirit that President Barnard of Columbia took up
arms. He considered its existence a national calamity.
But I shall return to this point later.

I will now describe the accident just mentioned, be-
cause it is closely connected with the main thread of my
narrative. In the beginning of the Easter term, the third
term of my training under Routh, I had caught up with
my class and had spare time for outside reading. Niven
was greatly impressed by my enthusiastic eulogies of
Maxwell's httle book, ''Matter and Motion," and he
suggested that I take up the reading of another of ]\Iax-
well's little classics, ''Theory of Heat." It was written
with the same elegant simplicity as his "Matter and Mo-
tion." This Httle text-book on heat was the first to give
me a living physical picture of the mode of operation by
which heat is transformed into mechanical work, an opera-
tion which I had watched so often in the Cortlandt Street
boiler-room. I had watched it, but I had never dreamed
that the operation could be described as Maxwell described
it. According to him it may be considered as the resultant
action of non-coordinated activities of an immense num-
ber of busy little molecules, each of which, as far as hu-

186 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

man observers can tell, moves about lustily according to
its own sweet will. But behold the miracle: the average
activity of the countless crowd obeys with mathematical
accuracy the fundamental law for heat transformations,
the so-called second law of thermodynamics discovered
by Sadi Carnot, the great French engineer. It was Max-
well's little classic which also informed me that in all
cases of very large numbers of individuals, whether they
be active molecules or busy human beings, exhibiting as
far as an observer can tell non-coordinated activities,
we must apply the so-called statistical method of inquiry,
that is, the method which statisticians employ in record-
ing the activity of a nation. Newton's dynamics, which
at that time had been the food of Cambridge for two cen-
turies, said nothing about that. It was a new idea in
the heads of new men, who, under the leadership of Max-
well, were creating a new and far-reaching science. Up
to that time Tyndall's poetical description of '^Heat as a
Mode of Motion" was my gospel regarding thermal phe-
nomena, but Maxwell's plain and modest text-book, in-
tended to stimulate the imagination of the inquisitive
mind of the young student, was the first to assist me in
forming my own judgment on the doctrines described
by Tyndall and illustrated by beautiful experiments.
Routh's training-table of tripos athletes offered no such
morsels of stimulating food, because these athletes were
training for tripos examinations and not for research in
physics. I will say now that it was in Maxwell's theory
of heat that I first saw the name of Willard Gibbs, and
I heard from Niven that Maxwell held Gibbs in very
high esteem. I must say also that Gibbs was the first
in this country to write a splendid treatise on statistical
mechanics.

When the Easter term approached its end in May I
began to think of my summer vacation. I needed one.

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 187

Seven months of steady drilling under Routh, supple-
mented by extra reading prescribed by him, and also
by the reading of Maxwell's inspiring books, had pro-
duced results with which I was satisfied, and so was Mr.
Niven, my Trinity College mentor. I certainly did not
feel any more like a goose wandering in a fog ; I saw much
light ahead, and felt much more confident that I saw the
goal for which I was steering. But my pitch was very
high and I needed de-tuning. I finally decided to visit
some little place in France and selected Pornic, on the
French Atlantic coast, in the department called Loire In-
ferieure. I knew nothing about it except what I had read
in Baedeker, but it looked to me like a quiet little place
where in addition to complete change of scene I should
have a good chance to learn French. The names of La-
place, La Grange, and Ampere were mentioned so often
and with so much veneration by Maxwell, that I felt
ashamed of my ignorance of the language of France. Por-
nic was only a day's journey from Cambridge, and off I
went with no other books in my bag beside Campbell's
^'Life of Maxwell" and a French granmiar.

The Pornic landlady was not up to the standard of
my Cambridge landlady, but I did not complain nor make
any invidious comparisons; the English were not very
popular in those days on the Atlantic coast of France,
where the oldest fishermen had not yet forgotten the op-
erations of the English fleet during the Napoleonic wars.
I was the only stranger in town, and when it became
known that I was an American who had come to Pornic
to study the language of France the village was mine. I
engaged the village schoolmaster to give me French con-
versation lessons. I met him in his garden every eve-
ning and we talked to our hearts' content. He was a
most entertaining Uttle fellow, with a bald head, a red
nose, and a big snuff-box to which he appealed very fre-
quently for a fresh supply of interesting topics of con-

188 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

versation. He boasted among the villagers that his repu-
tation as a French scholar had reached the United States
and, voild, had brought me to Pornic. I never denied
it, but on the contrary I often walked through the vil-
lage streets with the good old maitre d^ecole and listened
most attentively to his French accents as if they were
the rarest pearls of wisdom.

^Vhen the villagers found out that I was not only an
American but also a student of a great English university,
then the stock of the little schoolmaster rose sky-high.
My landlady informed me that the old cure had become
quite jealous of the little man's rapid rise in the com-
munity. An old but renovated Norman castle was a
part of Pornic ; it stood on the very edge of the steep coast
and it was inhabited in summer by a rich merchant of
Nantes. The castle had a thick grove of stately old
trees, and there the nightingales revelled. On moonlight
nights I spent many watchful hours listening to their
mellow notes, accompanied by the solemn rhythm of the
Atlantic waves striking gently upon the cliffs of the rocky
coast, which appeared in my imagination, as I listened,
like towering pipes of a giant organ. In daytime I se-
lected lonely spots on the coast and there I spent my
days from early morning till late in the afternoon memo-
rizing my French grammar and vocabulary. Every eve-
ning I practised for an hour or so in conversation with my
beloved maitre d'ecole. This advanced my knowledge of
French very rapidly and before one month was over I
could converse tolerably well. My circle of acquaintances
expanded rapidly as my knowledge of French increased,
until it took in the nightingale grove, including the family
of the merchant from Nantes. Between my friends in
the nightingale grove and my schoolmaster's garden my
conversation in French became so fluent that it aston-
ished the natives. They pronounced it perfect. But
discounting this enthusiastic estimate by even fifty per

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 189

cent I was still secure in my belief that I was enriched
by a good knowledge of the language of a great civiliza-
tion. A two months' visit to Pornic had been my plan;
its end was very near, and my trip was a success. I bade
good-by to my friends in little Pornic and arrived in Paris
on the following day, the fourteenth of July, 1884.

Paris was gay, celebrating the national holiday of
France, the anniversary of the storming of the Bastille
in 1789. This gave me a chance to see many of the strik-
ing characteristics of the gay side of Paris in a single day.
The next day, while visiting the great Sorbonne and the
College de France in the Quartier Latin, I found a great
treasure in a second-hand bookshop: La Grange's great
treatise, '^Mechanique Analytique," first published under
the auspices of the French Academ.y in 1788. La Grange,
the Newton of France ! There was no student of dynam-
ics who had not heard of his name and of his great trea-
tise. My two months' stay in Pornic had enabled me to
appreciate fully the beauty of the language of this great
work, and my training wdth Routh had eliminated many
difficulties of the mathematical technique. I was con-
vinced of that in my very first attempts in Paris at de-
ciphering some of its inspiring pages. I describe this
short stay in France at some length, because I wish to
refer to it later for the purpose of showing how little things
can exert a big influence in the shaping of human hfe.

I had promised my mother to visit her again during
that summer, and off I went, deserting without delay the
gay scenes of Paris. On my journey to Idvor I wasted
no time looking to the right or to the left of my speeding
train; villages and towns, rivers and mountains, and the
busy folks in the yellow fields who were gathering in the
blessings of the harvest season appeared like so many
passing pictures which did not interest me. La Grr.nge
was talking to me, and I had neither eyes nor ears for

190 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

anybody or for anything else. Oh, how happy I was
when I saw Idvor in the distance, where I knew I should
be free for nearly two months during that summer to
read and to reflect, free from all restraints of the Cam-
bridge routine. By the end of that heavenly vacation I
had mastered a good part of La Grange's classical treatise,
and in addition I had reread carefully Campbell's ^^Life of
Maxwell,'^ and I understood many things which I had
seen in Cambridge but had not understood before. The
Cambridge movement described above was clearly re-
vealed to me in the course of that summer, by a careful
study of Campbell's ^^Life of Maxwell."

Idvor was never rich in books nor in people who paid
much attention to books. To think that a native of Idvor
would ever read a La Grange in his humble peasant home
seemed incredible. The natives of Idvor noticed that,
during my second visit, I was much less communicative
than during the first, on account of my devotion to what
they considered some strange books, which to those who
saw them suggested sacred books. The company of
La Grange and of Maxwell kept me a prisoner in my
mother's garden. I told my mother that Maxwell and
La Grange were two great saints in the w^orld of science,
and she regarded my reading during that summer as a
study of the hves of saints. That made her happy, but
it puzzled the good people of Idvor. Studies of this
kind they associated with priests and bishops; and, notic-
ing that I paid much less attention to bagpipes and kolo
dancers and to other worldly things, they began to whis-
per about that Misha was getting ready to enter monastic
life. What a pity, they said, to gather so much knowledge
in great America and then bury it in a monastery !

My mother paid no attention to these idle whisperings.
She knew better. When I described to her the ancient
college buildings and the beautiful chapels of Cambridge,
and the rehgious life of the students and of the dons, she

STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 191

listened spellbound. Wlien I related to her the many
traditions of the old university, and informed her that
one learned there, not only from the teachers living
there at that time, but also from great teachers who
had long departed, a luminous expression in her eyes
told me that she was about to reveal to me an original
thought. '^1 go to church, my son," she said, ^^not so
much because I expect the priest to reveal to me some
new divine truth, but because I \\dsh to look at the icons
of saints. That reminds me of their saintly work, and
through the contemplation of their work I communicate
with God. Cambridge is a great temple consecrated to
the eternal truth : it is filled with icons of the great saints
of science. The contemplation of their saintly work will
enable you to communicate with the spirit of eternal
truth.''

With this thought in her mind my mother was most
happy when I bade her good-by and, repeating her own
words, told her that I must go back to '^Cambridge, the
great temple which is consecrated to the eternal truth.''
^^Go back, my son," she said, ^^and may God be praised
forever for the blessings which you have enjoyed and
will continue to enjoy in your life among the saints of
Cambridge."

VII

END OF STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF

CAMBRIDGE

When I returned to Cambridge from little Idvor I
often thought of my mother's words saying that I was
living among the saints of Cambridge. These words
sounded like the language which the minstrel of the old
Serbian ballads would have used, to convey the mean-
ing which she wished to convey. Whenever I saw one
of the great dons of Cambridge, like the famous mathe-
matician Cay ley, or the still more famous mathematical
physicist George Gabriel Stokes, the discoverer of fluores-
cence, I asked myself: ^^Are they the saints of Cam-
bridge?'' The answer was in the negative; most of these
men were too mobile to pass for saints. One of them, for
instance, although quite old and blind, was the stroke of
a boat which was very prominent on the river Cam. Its
crew consisted of Cambridge dons. When this aged stroke
was. not rowing he was riding a spirited horse, usually
galloping briskly, with his young daughter chasing along-
side of him, her long golden hair, like that of a valkyrie,
lashing the air as she made strenuous efforts to keep up
with her speedy father. It was impossible to associate
one's idea of saints with men of that type. But, never-
theless, my mother was right: Cambridge had its saints;
their memory was the great glory of Cambridge.

Nature, pubhshed in London, was then, as it is to-day,
the most popular scientific weekly in the United King-
dom. Many scientists of Cambridge used it as a medium
for discussing in a popular way the current scientific events
of the day. Among the files of Nature, which I consulted

192

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 193

often, I found once a beautiful steel engraving of Faraday,
together with a brief account of Faraday's work. It was
written by Maxwell, as I found out later. Speaking of
the activity of teachers of science, the writer said that
they are expected ^'to bring the student into contact
with two main sources of mental growth, the fathers of
sciences, for whose personal influence over the opening
miud there is no substitute, and the material things to
which their labors first gave meaning.'' In the light of
this thought I saw that in his two little classics, ^'jNIatter
and Motion" and ''Theory of Heat," Maxwell had
brought me into contact with the fathers of dynamical
sciences, and that La Grange, in his ''Mechanique Analy-
tique," had shown me the men w^ho were the fathers of
the science of dynamics, and that for this service I owed
them everlasting gratitude.

Jim, the humble fireman in the Cortlandt Street fac-
tory, told me once: ''This country, my lad, is a monu-
ment to the lives of men of brains and character and ac-
tion who made it." From that day on the name "United
States of America" recalled to my mind Washington,
Hamilton, Franklin, Lincoln, and the other great men
who are universally regarded as the fathers of this coun-
try; and when I learned to know and to appreciate them
I felt that I was qualified to consider myself a part of
this country. Maxwell and La Grange had taught me
that Archimedes, Galileo, Newton, Carnot, Hehnholtz,
and other great investigators had made the dynamical
sciences; and from that time on these sciences like monu-
ments recalled to my mind the names of the men who
made them. I never saw a man handhng a crowbar with-
out remembering that it was the historic lever which
in the philosophy of Archimedes served as the earliest
foundation for the science of statics. The word force
always recalled the picture of Galileo dropping heavy
bodies from the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and watching their

194 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

uniformly accelerated motions, produced by the force
which was impelhng the falUng body to the earth. The
picture reminded me that by these ideally simple experi-
ments Galileo had banished forever the mediaeval super-
stition that bodies fall because they are afraid of the
vacuum above, and had substituted in its place the simple
law of accelerating force, which prepared the foundation
for the science of dynamics. I never saw a moving train
being brought to a standstill by the frictional reactions
of the brakes without seeing in my imagination the image
of Newton formulating his great law of equality between
physical actions and physical reactions, the crowning
point of modern dynamics. These pictures illustrated
what Maxwell meant when he spoke of the material things
to which the labors of Archimedes, Galilfio, and Newton
gave a meaning, and when I caught that meaning I felt
that I was no longer a stranger in the land of science.
Their highest meaning, I knew, was the recognition that
the truth which they conveyed was a part only of what
my mother called the '^Eternal Truth."

My work in Cambridge, guided principally by Maxwell
and La Grange, reminded me, therefore, continually of
the fathers of the sciences which I was studying and of
the material things to which their labors gave a meaning.
These thoughts gave me a satisfactory interpretation of
my mother's words: ''Cambridge is a great temple con-
secrated to the eternal truth; it is filled with icons of the
great saints of science. The contemplation of their saintly
work will enable you to conmiunicate with the spirit of
eternal truth." My description of the scientific activity
of Cambridge had produced this image in her mind, which
was dominated by a spirit of piety and of reverence. This
spirit, I always thought, is needed in science just as much
as it is in religion. It was the spirit of Maxwell and of
La Grange.

The atmosphere of Cambridge was most favorable to

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 195

the cultivation of a spirit of reverence in scientific thought.
At that time, just as to-day, Newton's name was the
glory of Trinity College, and the name of Darwin was
regarded with the same feeling of reverence at Christ
College. Every college at Cambridge had at least one
great name which was the glory of that college. These,
one may say, were the names of the patron saints of Cam-
bridge; their spirit was present everywhere, and its in-
fluence was certainly wonderful. It reminded me of my
mother's words: ^^May God be praised forever for the
blessings which you have enjoyed and will continue to
enjoy in your life among the saints of Cambridge."

It may seem strange that a Cambridge student of
science should have worried so much about interpreting
his pious mother's words in terms of his expanding scien-
tific knowledge. But that student was once a Serb peasant
in whose early childhood the old Serbian ballads were his
principal spiritual food. The central figure of these bal-
lads was Prince Marko, the national hero, who at critical
moments of his tempestuous life never appealed for aid
to any man. When he needed counsel he asked it from
his aged mother Yevrosuna, and when he needed help
in combat he appealed to Vila Raviyoyla, Marko's adopted
sister, the greatest of all the fairies of the clouds. A
mother can have a wonderful influence over her boy
whose early mental attitude is moulded by impressions
of that kind. When she has that influence, then she if
her boy's oracle, and no amount of subsequent scientific
training will disturb that relationship.

I often think of an old idea which I first conceived
while a student at Cambridge. It is this: Our American
colleges and universities should have days consecrated to
the memories of what Maxwell called the fathers of the
sciences, • like Copernicus, GaUleo, Newton, Faraday,
Maxwell, Danvin, Helmholtz. I mention these names,
having physical sciences in mind, but similar names can

196 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

be mentioned in other departments of human knowledge.
Why should not science follow the beautiful example of
religion, which has its saints^ days? On these memorial
days, say Newton's birthday, an address on Newton and
his work should tell the young student why Newton is
the father of the science of dynamics. Dynamics is not
a mere collection of inexorable physical laws which to a
young student often sound like dry scientific facts and
mute formulae. Many text-books, unfortunately, repre-
sent it that way. It is a record of the life-work of men
who lived human lives and became what my mother called
^'saints of science," because they devoted their life-efforts
to the deciphering of divine messages which, through
physical phenomena, God addresses to man. The young
mind should know as early as possible that dynamics
had its origin in the heavens, in the motions of heavenly
bodies, and that it was brought to earth by Galileo and
Newton when they had deciphered the meaning of the
divine message conveyed to them by these celestial mo-
tions. The Greeks of old sacrificed to their gods a heca-
tomb of oxen whenever one of their philosophers dis-
covered a new theorem in geometry, and the philosopher's
memory was praised forever. The modern nations should
not remain indifferent to the memory of the '^ saints of
science," whose discoveries have advanced so much the
physical and the spiritual welfare of man. My life among
the saints of Cambridge suggested this idea, and my stu-
dents, past and present, know that I have always been
loyal to it, because I always beheved that in this manner
every American college and university could raise an in-
visible ^Hemple consecrated to the eternal truth" and fill
it with "icons of the great saints of science." A spirit of
reverence for the science which the student is studying
should be cultivated from the very start. I observed
that spirit among my friends, the mathematical tripos
men, at Cambridge; it was there as a part of local tradi-

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 197

tions. I certainly felt its influence, and the longer I stayed
at Cambridge the more I felt convinced that ^'Cambridge
is a great temple consecrated to the eternal truth.^' This
enabled me to recognize while still at Cambridge that
nothing was more characteristic of the mental attitude
of many scientific men in America and in England at that
time than their reverence for the ^^ saints of science" and
their strong desire to build great temples ^^consecrated
to the eternal truth.'' Maxwell was one of their leaders,
and the best illustration of that mental attitude. I have
already referred to this in my short allusion to the Cam-
bridge craving for scientific research, and I shall now at-
tempt to describe a much wider intellectual movement
of which this craving was a local manifestation only. I
felt the force of its current during my Cambridge days,
and I recognize to-day that at that time I moved along
following more or less unconsciously the stream-hnes of
this current.

The completion of the mathematical training under
Routh recommended by Niven was approaching its end,
and I was satisfied with its results. I could follow with-
out much effort the lectures of Stokes and Lord Rayleigh,
and I could handle the mathematics of Maxwell's theory
of electricity wdth considerable ease; but I did not under-
stand his physics.

President Barnard, of Columbia College, said once in
an address of fifty years ago that a young student in
America at that time lacked a ''knowledge of visible
things and not information about them — knowledge ac-
quired by the learner's o^vn conscious efforts, not crammed
into his mind in set forms of words out of books." His
statement fitted admirably my own case; I lacked that
knowledge of visible things which one gets from his own
conscious efforts; I had no knowledge of physics acquired
from my own conscious efforts in a physical laboratory.
Neither Columbia College nor any other college in the

198 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

United States, with very few exceptions, offered at that
time this opportunity to the student. I suspected that
this was the real secret of my inabiUty to understand
Maxwell's physics; I longed for work in a real physical
laboratory and made preparations to enter the Cavendish
Laboratory at Cambridge. But I learned, in the begin-
ning of 1885, that Lord Rayleigh had given up the direc-
torship of this laboratory, and that a Mr. J. J. Thomson
of Trinity College had been appointed as his successor, the
same Thomson who is to-day Sir John Joseph Thomson,
Master of Trinity College, and the leading physicist in
the world. The new director was only twenty-eight years
of age in the year of his appointment — at the end of 1884.
Although a second wrangler in the mathematical tripos
test of 1880, he was four years later already a sufficiently
famous experimental physicist to be appointed director
of the Cavendish Laboratory. The new director was
only two years older than myself, but he was already a
famous experimental physicist, whereas I had never had
a physical apparatus in my hand. ^Yhat will he think
of me, thought I, when I present myself to him and ask
for permission to work as a mere beginner in the Caven-
dish Laboratory! I blushed when I thought of it, and
I was afraid that I should blush even more when he
compared me to his younger students who had already
acquired much skill in physical manipulations. The fail-
ure of my competition with boys and girls in the speed
tests of punching biscuits in the Cortlandt Street cracker
factory came back to my memory; and I bemoaned,
just as I did in Cortlandt Street nine years before, my
hard luck of having had no earher training. Many an
American college student of physics bemoaned in those
days his lack of early laboratory training. ^\Tien I say
this I am touching the principal point of my narrative; it
is the point at which my narrative begins to sail on the
back of a wave which started actually when Johns Hop-

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 199

kins University was organized, in 1876, but the motive
power of which had been gathering long before that, per-
haps at the same time when the motive power of the Cam-
bridge movement in favor of scientific research was gath-
ering, resulting, as it had, in the estabUshment of the
Cavendish Laboratory. But I must resume the thread
of my story and return later to the point just mentioned.
My lack of what Barnard called '^knowledge of visible
things . . . acquired by the learner's own conscious ef-
forts . . .'' gave me much anxiety; and I often thought
that it would, perhaps, be better to go to some other uni-
versity where the director of the physical laboratory was
an older man, who would not notice my age as much as
would the new and extrem^ely young director of the Caven-
dish Laboratory. That thought, however, did not console
me much, because I was very much attached to Cambridge
and did not wish to give up what my mother called ^^life
among the saints of Cambridge." Just then, as if by an
act of kind providence, a letter from President Barnard
of Columbia College reached me, enclosing a letter of
introduction to Jolin Tyndall, the famous physicist, col-
league and successor of Faraday in the direction of the
Royal Institution. Barnard informed me that Columbia
had received a generous sum of money from Tyndall,
representing a part of the net proceeds from his famous
course of pubhc lectures on light, which he had delivered
in the United States in 1872-1873; that the income of
this sum would be given as a fellowship to a Columbia
graduate to assist him in his study of experimental physics ;
that the fellowship would be called a John Tjmdall Fel-
lowship, netting over five hundred dollars annually; and
that he and Rood, professor of physics at Columbia, con-
sidered me a suitable candidate. Unexpected things of
this kind happen every now and then, and when they do
they certainly encourage the belief that there is such a
thing as luck.

200 FROM IMIVnGRANT TO INVENTOR

I called on Tyndall without much delay, and deUvered
Barnard's letter of introduction. One may imagine how
I felt when I saw and spoke to the very man whose de-
scriptions of physical phenomena had been the first to
disclose to me on the top loft of the Cortlandt Street fac-
tory the poetical side of the physical sciences. I expected
to find a scientist looking like a poet and a dreamer, but
I did not. He looked exactly what he was: a plain and
benevolent Irishman. I had seen many an old Irishman,
among my New York friends and acquaintances, who
looked exactly as Tyndall looked; and when he spoke
there was also the fire, the vigor, and the humor of the
agile Irish mind. In less than the time it takes to tell
this he made me feel that I had always known him, and
that he was my old and generous friend. His questions
were wonderfully direct, just as direct, I thought, as the
questions which he addressed to physical phenomena
when in his famous lectures he was deciphering their
hidden meaning. He deciphered me very quickly, I
thought, as if I were the simplest physical phenomenon
which he had ever observed. The fact, however, that I
held his attention encouraged me. He apparently at-
tached no very great importance to my lack of early train-
ing in experimental physics, but advised me to avoid
further delay. He informed me, by way of encouraging
me, that he was over thirty when he took his doctor's
degree at the University of Marburg, in Germany. A
lack of early advantages, he thought, could always be
overcome by redoubling one's efforts in later years. His
own career proved that. He called my attention to a
short account of the work of the famous Helmholtz, writ-
ten for Nature by no less a man, he said, than great
Maxwell. This story, he thought, would show me that
the great professor at the University of Berlin did not
have early advantages in experimental physics, and that
he became a professor of physics when he was already

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRmGE 201

fifty years of age. He encouraged me to apply for the
new fellowship at Columbia as soon as it became opera-
tive, and to make up my mind quickly to migrate to the
best physical laboratory that I could find. I asked him
what laboratory he would recommend and he again di-
rected my attention to Maxwell's account of the work
of Helmholtz. When I was about to leave, promising,
at his request, to call again, he gave me a copy of his
lectures on hght, which he had delivered in the United
States thirteen years before. ^^Read them," he said,
^'and when you come again I shall be glad to discuss with
you some of the points of this httle book; they will ex-
plain to you the full meaning of President Barnard's
letter, and of its historical background. Read also vol-
ume VIII of Nature.'''

I had read Tyndall's lectures on light before I entered
Columbia College, but upon reading them again I found
there very many things which I had missed before. They
did not, of course, describe satisfactorily the physical
properties of the luminiferous ether — no lectures ever
did — but they did describe, I thought, a bit of the his-
tory of physical sciences in the United States which was
a revelation to me, and was, as I know now, a most im-
portant contribution to the history of the development
of scientific thought in the United States. It deserves
a prominent place in this narrative, because I had been a
witness of this development during the past forty years.

Joseph Henry, the most distinguished American phys-
icist, together with other distinguished American scientists,
among them President Barnard of Columbia College,
invited Tyndall, in 1872, to deliver a course of lectures in
some of the principal cities in the United States. The
object of these lectures was, quoting Tyndall's words,
"to show the uses of experiment in the cultivation of
natural knowledge," hoping that this "would materially

202 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

promote scientific education in this country." Tyndall
delivered his famous course of six lectures on Ught in
Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Wash-
ington. Joseph Henry, as secretary of the Smithsonian
Institution and president of the National Academy of
Sciences, took them under his personal direction. The
success of these lectures surpassed even the most sanguine
expectations. At the farewell dinner to Tyndall some of
the wisest scientific intellects of the land were heard, and
their words indicated clearly what was the uppermost
thought in the minds of the scientific men of the United
States when they invited Tyndall. I quote here some of
the words spoken by these men.

President Barnard of Columbia, the first American
expounder of the undulatory theory of light, said:

I say, then, that our long-established and time-honored system of
liberal education . . . does not tend to form original investigators of
nature's truths. . . .

Among the great promoters of scientific progress . . . how large is
the number who may, in strict propriety, be said to have educated
themselves? Take, for illustration, such familiar names as those of
William Herschel, and Franklin, and Rumford, and Rittenhouse, and
Davy, and Faraday, and Henry. Is it not evident that nature herself,
to those who will follow her teachings, is a better guide to the study of
her own phenomena than all the training of our schools? And is not
this because nature invariably begins with the training of the observ-
ing faculties ?

The moral of this experience is, that mental culture is not secured
by pouring information into passive recipients; it comes from stimu-
lating the mind to gather knowledge for itself. ... If we would fit
man properly to cultivate nature . . . our earliest teachings must be
things and not words.

Doctor John WiUiam Draper, the world-renowned
American investigator of the laws of radiation from hot
bodies, said:

Nowhere in the world are to be found more imposing political prob-
lems than those to be settled here; nowhere a greater need of scientific

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 203

knowledge. I am not speaking of ourselves alone, but also of our Cana-
dian friends on the other side of the St. Lawrence. We must join to-
gether in generous emulation of the best that is done in Europe. . . .
Together we must try to refute what De Tocqueville has said about us,
that communities such as ours can never have a love of pure science.

Andrew Wliite, President of Cornell, said:

I will confine myself to the value, in our political progress, of the
spirit and example of some of the scientific workers of our day and
generation. What is the example which reveals that spirit? It is an
example of zeal, zeal in search for the truth ... of thoroughness — of
the truth sought in its wholeness ... of bravery, to brave all outcry
and menace ... of devotion to duty without which no scientific work
can be accomplished ... of faith that truth and goodness are insepar-
able.

The reverence for scientific achievement, the revelation of the high
honors which are in store for those who seek for truth in science — the
inevitable comparison betw^een a life devoted to the great pure search,
on the one hand, and a life devoted to place-hunting or self-grasping
on the other — all these shall come to the minds of thoughtful men in
lonely garrets of our cities, in remote cabins of our prairies, and there-
by shall come strength and hope for higher endeavor,

Tyndall responded in part as follows:

It would be a great thing for this land of incalculable destinies to
supplement its achievements in the industrial arts by those higher
investigations from which our mastery over nature and over indus-
trial art itself has been derived. ... To no other country is the culti-
vation of science, in its highest form, of more importance than to yours.
In no other country would it exert a more benign and elevating in-
fluence. . . . Let chairs be founded, sufficiently but not luxuriously
endowed, which shall have original research for their main object and
ambition. . . . The willingness of American citizens to throw their
fortunes into the cause of public education is, as I have already stated,
without parallel in my experience. Hitherto their efforts have been
directed to the practical side of science. . . . But assuredly among
your men of wealth there are those willing to listen to an appeal on
higher grounds. ... It is with the view of giving others the chance
that I enjoyed, among my noble and disinterested German teachers,
that I propose, after deducting, with strict accuracy, the sums which

204 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

have been actually expended on my lectures, to devote every cent of the
money which you have so generously poured in upon me to the education
of young American philosophers in Germany.

What a splendid example to the men of wealth to whom
Tyndall was appealing ! We shall see later that the ap-
peal was not made in vain.

But the sentiments expressed at this dinner were echoes,
only, of Tyndall's thundering voice, to which America
listened spellbound when he delivered the last of his course
of six lectures on light. In the last part of this lecture,
called '^ Summary and Conclusions," he first erected what
my mother would have called ''a temple consecrated to
the eternal truth" which we call light, and in that temple
he placed what she would have called 'Hhe icons of the
saints of the science" of Hght. The names of Alhazan,
VitelUo, Roger Bacon, Kepler, Snellius, Newton, Thomas
Young, Fresnel, Stokes, and Kirchhoff stood there hke
so many icons of saints which one sees on the altars of
orthodox churches. In this he surpassed, I thought, even
Maxwell and La Grange, and that was saying a great
deal. He stood in the middle of that temple and chal-
lenged the statement once made by De Tocqueville that
^Hhe man of the North has not only experience but knowl-
edge. He, however, does not care for science as a pleasure,
and only embraces it with avidity when it leads to useful
applications." Tyndall proceeded to draw a clear dis-
tinction between science and its applications, pointing
out that technical education without original investiga-
tions will ^'lose all force and growth, all power of repro-
duction," just ''as surely as a stream dwindles when the
spring dies out." ''The original investigator," said Tyn-
dall, "constitutes the fountainhead of knowledge. It
belongs to the teacher to give this knowledge the requisite
form; an honorable and often difficult task. But it is
a task which receives its final sanctification when the
teacher himself honestly tries to add a rill to the great

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 205

stream of scientific discovery. Indeed, it may be doubted
whether the real Hfe of science can be fully felt and com-
municated by the man who has not himself been taught
by direct communion with nature. We may, it is true,
have good and instructive lectures from men of ability,
the whole of whose knowledge is second-hand, just as we
may have good and instructive sermons from intellec-
tually able and unregenerate men. But for that power
of science which corresponds to what the Puritan fathers
would call experimental religion in the heart, you must
ascend to the original investigator."

Many more passages could be quoted from Tyndall's
*' Summary and Conclusions" of his American lectures.
Suffice it to say here that the cause of scientific research
in this countr^^ never had a more eloquent advocate than
Tyndall. The message w^hich he delivered in his Amer-
ican lecture tour in 1872-1873 was heard and heeded in
every part of the United States and of the British Em-
pire. It is no exaggeration to say that the response to
this call was the movement for scientific research in Amer-
ican colleges and universities which dates from those
memorable years. It was in its earliest days under the
leadership of the famous Joseph Henry, President Bar-
nard, and other American scientists who had associated
themselves in the National Academy of Sciences which
was chartered by an act of Congress in 1863.

I shall try to show in the course of this narrative that
it was the greatest intellectual movement in the United
States, producing results of which nobody could even
have dreamed fifty years ago; and the end is not yet in
sight.

Tyndall had called my attention to volume VIII of
Nature. The article on Faraday I had read before, but
there were a large number of other communications ad-
vocating strongly the stimulation of scientific research
In colleges and universities. Tyndall's '^ Summary and

206 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Conclusions" had aroused a deep interest in my mind
for these things, and besides, they furnished a most wel-
come sidelight upon the Cambridge movement which, as
described above, I had felt before I met Tyndall. The
University of Cambridge was severely criticised in these
communications by some Cambridge dons themselves on
account of the alleged entire absence of the scientific re-
search stimulus. One of these criticisms is so character-
istic of the feeling of Cambridge in 1873 that it deserves
a special reference. It is in volume VIII of Nature and is
entitled: ^'A Voice from Cambridge." A very brief ab-
stract follows:

It is known all over the world that science is all but dead in Eng-
land. By science, of course, we mean that searching for new knowledge
which is its own reward. ... It is also known that science is per-
haps deadest of all at our universities. Let any one compare Cam-
bridge, for instance, with any German university; nay, with even some
provincial offshoots of the University of France. . . . What, then, do
the universities do? They perform the functions, for too many of
their students, of first-grade schools merely, and that in a manner
about which opinions are divided; and superadded to these is an enor-
mous examining engine, on the most approved Chinese model, always
at work. . . .

. Not even President Barnard could have uttered a more
severe criticism ! The most forcible appeal was made by
the president of the British Association for the Advance-
ment of Science at its meeting in Bradford, in September,
1873. This I also found in volume VIII of Nature. These
stirring appeals were published several months after
Tyndall's lecture tour in the United States, and they
all sounded to me like so many echoes of the thundering
voice with which he delivered the ^^ Summary and Con-
clusions" of his American lectures.

These studies, recommended by Tyndall, gave me a
view of science which I did not have before. I caught a
glimpse of it from the books of Maxwell and La Grange,

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 207

to which I referred above. The reahns of science are a
strange land to a youth who enters them, just as the
United States was a strange land to me when I landed
at Castle Garden. Maxwell, La Grange, and Tyndall
were the first to teach me how to catch the spirit of the
strange land of science, and when I caught it I felt as
confident as I did in Cortlandt Street after I had read
and understood the early historical documents of the
United States. I knew that soon I should be able to ap-
ply for citizenship in that great state called science. These
were the thoughts which I carried with me w^hen I started
out for my second visit to Tyndall.

When I called on Tyndall again, a month or so after
my first visit, I took along a definite plan for my future
work. This pleased him, because he had advised me that
every youth must think through his own head, the same
advice which was given me some years later by Professor
Willard Gibbs, of Yale. I assured Tyndall that my sec-
ond reading of the ^^ Summary and Conclusions," his
sixth American lecture, had cleared my vision, and that
I knew perfectly what my next step should be. He was
much amused when I told him how, eighteen months
before, I had wandered into Cambridge like a goose into
a fog, and asked me where I got that expression. I told
him that it was a Serbian saying, and he looked perfectly
surprised when I told him that I was a Serb by birth.

'^Well, I did not decipher you as quickly as you said
I did. I thought," said he, referring to my habit of em-
phasizing the sound of the letter r in my pronunciation,
that you were a native American of Scotch ancestry."
AVhy not of Irish?" asked I, entering into his jocose
mood. ^^Ah, my young friend," said he, w^ith a merry
twinkle in his eye, ^'you are too deliberate and too cau-
tious to suggest the Irish type. I do not know what I
would have thought had I seen you when you wandered
into Cambridge 'like a goose into a fog.' '

208 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

He was evidently much impressed by my careful analy-
sis of his ''Summary and Conclusions" and of its effect
upon the minds of American and English scientists. See-
ing that he enjoyed informal conversation and encouraged
it, I told him of my Alpine experiences in Switzerland
and of the anxiety I caused to my English acquaintance
because I was far from being ''too deliberate and too
cautious." "Well," said he, "I might have suspected
an Irish ancestry if I had met you in Switzerland twenty
months ago. But you have changed wonderfully since
that time, and if you keep it up the goose that came to
Cambridge may be quite a swan when it departs from
Cambridge."

I informed Tyndall that Maxwell's glowing account
of Helmholtz, which I had seen in Campbell's life of Max-
well, and in Nature, to which he had referred me, had
decided me to migrate from Cambridge to Berlin and
take up the study of experimental physics in Helmholtz 's
famous laboratory. He looked pleased, and referring
good-naturedly to my goose simile again, he said jokingly:
"You are no longer a goose in a fog. Let Helmholtz de-
cide whether you are a swan or not." Then, growing
more serious, he added: "You will find in the Berlin
laboratory the very things which my American and Brit-
ish friends and I should Hke to see in operation in all col-
lege and university laboratories in America and in the
British Empire. In this respect the Germans have been
leading the world for over forty years, and they have
been splendid leaders." This, then, was the reason, I
thought, w^hy, twelve years before, Tyndall said to his
New York friends: "I propose ... to devote every
cent of the money which you have so generously poured
in upon me to the education of young American philoso-
phers in Germany."

I ventured to address to the very informal Tyndall
the following informal question: "Since in your opinion

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 209

I am no longer a goose in a fog, you will have no objec-
tion if I apply to the Columbia authorities to send me as
their ^ young American philosopher/ as their first Tyndall
fellow, to Berlin, w^ill you?" ^'No, my friend,'^ said he,
''I have already urged you to do so. Remember, how-
ever, that a Tyndall fellow must never permit himself
to wander like a goose in a fog, but must strive to carry
his head high up like a swan, his body floating upon the
clear waters of stored-up human knowledge, and his vision,
mounted on high, searching for new communications with
the spirit of eternal truth, as your mother expressed it so
well.'^ He liked my mother's expressions, ^^ temple con-
secrated to the eternal truth," and 'Hhe icons of the great
saints of science."

I will add here that Tyndall's mental attitude toward
science appeared to me to be the same as my mother's
mental attitude toward religion. God was the great
spiritual background of her rehgion, and the works of
the prophets and of the saints were, according to her
faith, the only sources from which the human mind can
draw the light which will illimciinate this great spiritual
background. Hence, as I said before, her fondness for
and her remarkable knowledge of the words of the
prophets and the hves of saints. The '^eternal truth"
was, according to my understanding at that time, the
sacred background of Tyndall's scientific faith, and the
works of the great scientific discoverers, their Hves, and
their methods of inquiry into physical phenomena were
the only sources from which the human mind can draw
the light which will illuminate that sacred background.
He nourished that faith with a rehgious devotion, and
his appeals in the name of that faith were irresistible.
His friends in America and in England, who were glad
to have him as their advocate of the cause of scientific
research, had the same faith that he had, and they nour-
ished it with the same religious devotion. I know to-

210 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

day, and I suspected it at that time, that this faith was
kindled and kept ahve in the hearts of those men both
here and in the British Empire by the Hght of the Ufe
and of the wonderful discoveries of Michael Faraday,
and by the prophetic vision which led this great scientist
to his discoveries. He was their contemporary and his
achievements, like a great search-light, showed them the
true path of scientific progress.

My last visit to Tyndall took place toward the end of
the last, that is, the Easter, term, and when I returned to
Cambridge I informed my friends that at the end of the
term I would migrate to Berlin. It was not necessary for
me to assure them how badly I felt to leave what they
often heard me call ''the saints and the sacred precincts
of Cambridge ''; they knew of my reverence for the place
and they also knew my reasons for that reverence. They
understood my reverent devotion to the memory of New-
ton, but they did not quite understand my similar de-
votion to the memory of Maxwell. How could they?
None of his classics were necessary in order to solve the
problems usually served before the candidates for the
mathematical tripos honors. Neither could they under-
stand my admiration for La Grange, who, in their opinion,
was only an imperfect interpreter of Newton. Helmholtz
they appreciated more, but the exalted opinion which
Maxwell had of Helmholtz had not yet penetrated among
my mathematical chums at Cambridge. They were sorry
to lose me, they said, but they did not envy me, because
they did not see that Berlin had anything which Cam-
bridge did not have. This never was the opinion of Max-
well and it was not at that time the opinion of Tyndall.

Tyndall was the only physicist that I had ever met
who had known Faraday personally. He was Faraday's
co-worker in the Royal Institution for many years, and
to him and Maxwell I owe my earliest knowledge of Fara-
day's wonderful personaUty. Tyndall conducted me into

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 211

that knowledge by word of mouth, and his conversation
about Faraday's personaHty and scientific temperament
thrilled me. I told him that I had bought in a Cam-
bridge second-hand book-shop three volumes of Faraday's
^^ Electrical Researches'' for three shillings, and Tyndall
remarked: ''Faraday is still quite cheap at Cambridge."
Then, after some meditation, he added: ''Read them;
their story is just as new and as stirring to-day as it was
when these volumes were first printed. They will help
you much to interpret Maxwell." He presented me with
a copy of his story, "Faraday as a Discoverer," which
closes with the words:

"Just and faithful knight of God."

In this book Tyndall drew the same picture of Fara-
day which Campbell had given me of Maxwell. One can
imagine what it meant to the w^orld to bring these two
spiritual and intellectual giants into personal contact
during the period of 1860-1865, when Maxwell was pro-
fessor at King's College, London, and Faraday was at
the Royal Institution, where he had been for nearly sixty
years. It was significant that at the close of that period,
that is, in January, 1865, Maxw^ell. in a letter to an inti-
mate friend, said this:

"I have a paper afloat, with an electromagnetic theory
of light, which, till I am convinced to the contrary, I
hold to be great guns."

A very strong claim made by the most modest of men !
The paper was presented during that year to the Royal
Society and was "great guns." It marks, like Newton's
discovery of the law of gravitation and his formulation
of the laws of dynamics, a new epoch in science. In Max-
well I saw a Newton of the electrical science, but I con-
fess that in those days nothing more substantial than
my youthful enthusiasm justified me in that opinion.
I was aware that my knowledge of Faraday's discoveries

212 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

and of Maxwell's interpretation of them was quite hazy,
and I made up my mind to get more light before I started
out for Berlin.

The summer vacation was on and I decided to take
Faraday's '^Electrical Researches" to Scotland, the land
of Maxwell. In the preface to his great — and to me, at that
time, enigmatic — electrical treatise Maxwell modestly had
stated that he was an interpreter, only, of Faraday. But
I was delighted when I heard Tyndall's suggestion that
Faraday would help me to interpret Maxwell. Perhaps,
thought I, the invigorating air of Maxwell's native Scot-
land would help me to catch some of the ideas which
Maxwell had caught when he was reading Faraday. I
selected what I thought would be a quiet and secluded
spot, the island of Arran. It belonged to the Duke of
Hamilton, and I was told that his grace had imposed so
many restrictions upon his tenants that the island had
become an ideal spot for those who sought seclusion.
I found there a neat little inn at Corrie. It was sur-
rounded by several tiny cottages for summer visitors
who took their meals at the inn. It was popular with
people from Glasgow, Greenock, and Paisley. Every one
of the visiting families was blessed with numerous daugh-
ters. They were very athletic and played tennis from
early morning till late in the afternoon, interrupted now
and then by swinmiing contests in the frigid waters of
the Firth of Clyde. In the evening there was lively danc-
ing— not easy-going waltzing, but the real fling and reel
of the strenuous Highland type. ''What a sturdy race
this is," I said to myself, as I watched the dancers work-
ing themselves up into a frenzy of rhythmic movements,
one hand resting upon the hip, the other raised high up
in the air, while their joyful limbs were pumping up and
down in perfect rhythm as if they were busy pulUng up
from mother earth all the earthly joys stored up there
for mortal man. The whole scene was particularly thrilHng

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 213

to me when a piper came along and furnished the music.
The bagpipes reminded me of my native Idvor, and made
me feel at home in bonny Scotland before I had been
much ov^er a week in Arran. The Scotch and the Serbs
have many things in common, and I always believed
that somevv^here back in the history of Iran they must
have belonged to the same tribe. I am told that at the
Macedonian front the Scotch and the Serbian soldiers
got along beautifully, as if they had known each other
from time immemorial, and they had little use for the
other races assembled there. I got along at Corrie as if
I had known the Scotch all my life. But that had its
disadvantages also. I came to Corrie looking for seclusion
where, undisturbed, I could communicate wdth Faraday.
But the lively lassies from Glasgow, Greenock, and Pais-
ley, the tennis and the swimming contests, the fascinat-
ing sound of the bagpipes accompanying the stirring
Flighland dances — all these things whispered into my
ear: ^^ Faraday can wait, but your friends here cannot."
Then I remembered a passage in one of Maxwell's letters,
given in Campbell's life of Maxwell, which said: ^'Well,
work is good and reading is good, but friends are better."
What a splendid excuse for joining the lassies and the
lads at Corrie and revelling in the healthful pursuits of
their youthful exuberance! Besides, said I to myself,
have I not accomplished enough during my eighteen
months' drilling under Routh, Maxwell, La Grange, Ray-
leigh, Stokes, and Tyndall to deserve a complete change
of mental and physical activity? When a person looks
for an excuse to do what he or she likes to do a splendid
excuse can always be found, and so I bade a temporary
farewell to Faraday's ^^ Electrical Researches," and joined
the playful activities of my Corrie friends, challenging
them to go the limit. In tennis and swimming I held
my own, but the Highland reels floored me every time,
until Madge, one of the sturdy lassies from Greenock,

214 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

by persistent private instruction finally succeeded in
initiating me into the mysteries of the Highland rhythm.
Glen Sannox, near Corrie, with its rich bed of heather,
watched me often by the hour making many futile efforts
to catch this rhythm and make my limbs obey it. No-
body else watched these efforts in lonely Glen Sannox
excepting Madge, and she, I told her, had more fun than
a Bosnian gypsy training his bear. I can still hear the
slopes of Glen Sannox echoing the clear notes of her ring-
ing laughter, whenever I made an awkward and clumsy
movement in my persistent efforts to master the High-
land fling or reel. She could not help it, and I did not
mind it, because I had made up my mind to do the trick
or die. Finally I did it, not very well, but well enough
for a fellow who was not a Scotchman, and Madge pre-
sented me with my portrait in pencil, which she drew
during the intermissions between my efforts to master
the art of the Highland dances. That was my reward
and it was a very good one; she was a most promising
young artist who had won several prizes in the Greenock
art school. The memory of this experience always re-
called to my mind the thoughts which went through my
head at that time — the thoughts, namely, that Scotch
originahty, individuaUty, and sturdiness are hard to
follow, not only when a foreigner meets these wonderful
qualities in the mental activity of a Scot, like the mental
activity of a Maxwell, but also in physical activity hke
that displayed in the national dances of Scotland. One
does not appreciate fully the wonderful qualities of the
Scot until he tries to master the theory and the practice
of the Highland fling or reel. Maxwell's electrical theory,
I thought, might be just as different from other electrical
theories as the Highland dances are different from the
dances of other nations. I found out later that my guess
was not very far from the truth.

Several years ago I was driving through the streets of

END OF STUDIES AT CAMBRIDGE 215

London, visiting England again after an absence of many-
years. Suddenly I saw a crowd watching a Scotch dancer.
The dancer was a young woman in Highland costume,
and she was dancing the sword dance exquisitely; her
husband was playing the bagpipes, marching up and
down with all the swagger of the Scotch Highlander. I
stopped my cab, got out, and watched. The memories
of Corrie and Oban and of the gathering of the clans there
which I witnessed while at Arran came back, and I was
thrilled. Presently the dancer reached me in her tour
soHciting voluntary contributions. I threw a sovereign
into her plate and she looked surprised and asked me
whether I had not made a mistake. '^Yes,'' said I, '^I
did make a mistake when I went out with only one sover-
eign in my pocket. If I had two you should have them
both.'^ ^'Are you a Scotchman, sir?" she asked jokingly,
and when I said ^'No" she smiled and said: ^^I did not
think you were." She knew that there was a fundamental
difference between a Scot and a Serb.

After I had been at Corrie for about a month a letter
arrived from my mother, written by my oldest sister,
telhng me how happy she was that I had decided to spend
my summer in Scotland for the purpose of meditating
over the hfe and the work of one of the greatest ^^ saints
of science." I meant Faraday when I wrote to her. She
also told me that Idvor was fearfully dusty on account
of a long-continued drought, and that the crops were
poor and the vintage prospects even poorer, and that
Idvor was not a very cheerful place during that summer
for anybody who wished to meditate free from complaints
of grumbling neighbors. ^'Berlin, I am told, is much
nearer to Idvor and when you are there you can always
run down to Idvor, much more easily than you can now,"
she said, closing her letter, in v/hich logic and motherly
love vied with each other to furnish her with a consolation
for my absence from Idvor during that summer.

216 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

My mother's letter made me feel guilty and it called
for a reconsideration of my first resolution, adopted a
month earlier, which authorized me to bid a temporary
farewell to Faraday's^' Electrical Researches" ; and I passed
another resolution rescinding my first. But the question
arose, how to carry it into effect. The answer was ob-
vious: bid good-by to Corrie. My friends, however, sug-
gested a less obvious but certainly a much more agreeable
answer. '^Go up and live in the Macmillan homestead,
and read your Faraday there in the morning and come
down to Corrie for dinner, late in the afternoon," sug-
gested Madge, and the suggestion was adopted without
a dissenting voice on the part of my young friends.

The Macmillan homestead was a very humble old
cottage located half-way between Corrie and the top of
Goat Fell Mountain, the highest point on the island of
Arran. An old crofter and his wife lived there, leading
one of the most frugal existences that I had ever seen
anywhere. They were willing to furnish me with lodging
and simple breakfast, consisting of tea and oatmeal por-
ridge with some bread covered with a thin layer of Amer-
ican lard. I did not object; I was prepared to take up
low hving and high thinking for the love of Michael Fara-
day^ Communion with Faraday from early morning until
four in the afternoon, and after that any play that came
along, with plenty of dancing in the evening, was a splen-
did combination. Practically one solid meal a day, my
dinner at the Corrie inn, supplied the fuel for all this
activity, and it did it satisfactorily. Hov/ could I com-
plain? The man whose wonderful scientific discoveries
I was absorbing each day started life as a bookbinder's
apprentice, and the founder of the great Macmillan pub-
lishing-house was born and passed his boyhood days in
the humble cottage where I was lodging. I was sure that
in their youth they never had more than one solid meal
a day and they prospered. My rapid absorption and di-

END OF STUDIES AT CA3IBRIDGE 217

gestion of the mental food which Faraday offered I at-
tributed to my avoidance of superfluous physical food,
but I must confess that I was quite hungry when dinner
was served at the Corrie inn, and I enjoyed it immensely.
I never understood the full meaning of low living and
high thinking as well as I did while I was a lodger at
the Macmillan homestead. My thinking machinery, I
thought, never worked better, and even my vision, al-
ways very good, seemed to be better than ever before.
On exceptionally clear days I was sure that from the
high elevation of the Macmillan cottage, on the slope
of Goat Fell INIountain, I could see the beautiful Firth
of Clyde as far as Greenock and Paisley, and at times
even the gray and gloomy edifices of Glasgow seemed to
loom up in the distance. I bragged about it, but my
friends at Corrie met my bragging by informing me, jok-
ingly, that any Scotchman can see much farther than
that. One of them, a pupil of Sir William Thomson at
the University of Glasgow, met my bragging by the epi-
grammatic question: "Can you see in Faraday as far as
Maxwell, the Scotchman, saw?'' I never bragged again
about my vision while I was in Scotland. I was certain,
however, that from the Macmillan homestead on the
slopes of Goat Fell Mountain I obtained a deeper view
into Faraday's discoveries than I could have obtained in
any other place. I seldom mention the names of Fara-
day and ^laxwell without recalling to memory the beau-
tiful island of Arran and the humble Macmillan home-
stead on Goat Fell Mountain.

VIII

STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN

Every period in the history of mankind had its reve-
lation in science. Some periods were most fortunate in
this respect. The first half of the nineteenth century-
saw the great scientific revelation called the Principle of
Conservation of Energy, and considered it its greatest
glory. Our own American philosopher, Benjamin Thomp-
son, of Woburn, Massachusetts, known in Europe as
Count Rumford, was one of several early prophets in
science who foresaw the advent of this great dynamical
doctrine. Its importance to mankind cannot be over-
estimated. I am sure that many a scientific man of those
days felt grateful to heaven for the blessing of having
lived during the age when that great revelation was re-
ceived by mankind. The scientific men of to-day are
grateful for having lived during the second half of the
nineteenth century, when the great electromagnetic theory
was revealed to man. Its importance, likewise, cannot
be overestimated. But there is a radical difference in the
historical progress of these two nineteenth-century reve-
lations in science. The existence of the first was intui-
tively foreseen and may be said to have existed in one
form or another in the minds of many scientific men long
before it received its final form of statement. Its formu-
lator, Helmholtz, thought that he was not announcing
anything new, but was only stating his own view of some-
thing that was already well known. After his announce-
ment, in 1847, every scientific man accepted the revela-
tion as an almost seK-evident truth. The electromagnetic

218

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 219

theory of light and of matter had a different history. It
was born as a dim vision in the mind of a single man,
Faraday, and nearly fifty years elapsed before it was
formulated by Maxwell and experimentally demonstrated
by Hertz. It was only then that the world began to un-
derstand that a great scientific revelation had appeared
to man. To-day we know that new physical concepts
requiring a new language for their expression had to be
created in the minds of scientific men before the modern
electromagnetic doctrine could be revealed to the world.
The first glimpses of that revelation I caught on the slope
of Goat Fell Mountain, and two years later I saw in Ber-
lin what I believed to be a clear outline of its meaning.

When I look back to those days and consider how few
were the physicists who had caught this meaning even
twenty years after it was stated by Maxwell in 1865, I
wonder whether it is possible to-day to convey that mean-
ing to people who are not trained physicists. I think it
is, and I believe that the attempt should be made, because
the electromagnetic doctrine is to-day recognized to be
the very foundation of all our knowledge of physical
phenomena. I also think that one of the best methods
of conveying that meaning is to describe my early at-
tempts which failed to catch it.

Faraday's discoveries in the electrical science during
the first half of the nineteenth century attracted world-
wide attention and admiration. I knew that much at
Arran, and I also knew of the rapid growth of the prac-
tical applications of his discoveries, to telegraphy, to gen-
eration of electrical power for electrical lighting, electrical
traction, and electrochemical work, and finally to tele-
phonic transmission of speech. The world understood
that all these wonderful things, which contributed so
much to the comforts of mankind, came from those
sources in the realm of abstract science which were
opened up by Faraday's discoveries. Scientific research

220 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

began to assume a different aspect even in the eyes of
the captains of industry who in those days showed
lamentable indifference to science which did not promise
immediate tangible returns. The advocates of scientific
research, like Tyndall and his American and British
friends, pointed with pride to Faraday's work whenever
a question arose concerning the practical value of research
in the domain of the so-called abstract physical sciences.
This helped very much to arouse in this country and in
Great Britain a deeper interest in what Andrew White
called '^strength and hope for higher endeavor."

But Tyndall's and Maxwell's descriptions of Faraday
and of his work convinced me that Faraday's exalted
position among his contemporaries like Maxwell, Henry,
Tyndall, and Barnard was due not so much to the imme-
diate practical value of his electrical discoveries, great
as that value certainly was, as it was to the clear vision
with which he searched for and revealed new morsels
of the eternal truth. It was clear to me even at that time
that inventions are the handwork of mortal man and
that, though at first they appeal to us, as they ought to,
as wonderful creations of human ingenuity, their ultimate
fate is to become more or less commonplace. The tele-
graph and the telephone, the dynamo and the motor, the
light of the electrical arc and of the incandescent filament,
had lost much of their awe-inspiring character even at
the time when I was a student at Cambridge. Inventions
grow old and are superseded by other inventions, and,
being the creation of the constructive schemes of mortal
man, are themselves mortal. But the laws which the
stars and the planets obey and have always obeyed in
their paths through the heavens are unchangeable; they
never grow old, and therefore they are immortal; they
are a part of the eternal truth. We do not know of any
natural processes by which eternal things have been
evolved. Their existence is the best philosophic proof

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 221

that back of all this changeable visible world there is
the unchangeable, the eternal divinity. Archimedes,
Galileo, and Newton co-operated in the discovery of im-
mutable laws, and thereby revealed to mortal man mor-
sels of the eternal truth. Oerstedt, a hundred years ago,
discovered a morsel of the eternal truth when he dis-
covered the magnetic force which is produced by the
motion of electricity. Discoveries of mimortal things
and of the immutable laws which direct the mission of
their immortal existence are themselves immortal. Their
discoverers are, and deserve to be, immortal. Tyndall
and Maxwell were the first to show me that Faraday
occupied a distinguished place among such immortals as
Archimedes, Galileo, Newton, and Oerstedt.

The closing sentence of Maxwell's biographical sketch
of Faraday, in vol. VIII of Nature, referred to above,
reads as follows:

We are probably ignorant even of the name of the science which
will develop out of the materials we are now collecting, when the great
philosopher next after Faraday makes his appearance.

To me these prophetic words indicated that Maxwell
had something in his mind which was not explicitly ex-
pressed in Faraday's discoveries, but which enabled ]\Iax-
well to speak like a prophet. The words of a prophet
are not always easy to understand. I discovered later
that, when the world with the aid of the Hertzian experi-
ments had caught Maxwell's meaning, then a new and
wonderful epoch in the history of the physical sciences
was inaugurated. Its end is not yet in sight. This in-
auguration I witnessed during my student days in Berlin.
It is, I believe, of considerable interest to record here
how the scientific world, as I saw it at that time, appeared
to be preparing to receive the great revelation w^hich was
delivered to it on that historic inauguration day in 1887.
My communion with Faraday on the island of Arran

222 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

began my own preparation for this inauguration day by
developing gradually in my mind new physical concepts,
which I discovered later to be fundamental physical con-
cepts in the modern views of physics. Long before I
had finished my reading of Faraday's ^^Experimental
Researches in Electricity/' I began to understand why
Tyndall, referring to them, said: ^^Read them; their
story is just as new and as stirring to-day as it was when
these volumes were first printed. They will help you
much to interpret Maxwell." The same statement is
true to-day, and therefore I proceed now, with much
trepidation, to tell a part at least of that story as briefly
as I can, in order to describe, even if it be quite inade-
quately, Faraday's relation to the present great epoch
of modern physics, the epoch of the electromagnetic view
not only of light but also of matter.

The gradual development of this view was due to the
gradual development of new physical concepts which
were born in Faraday's mind and existed there as a poet-
ical vision; but in Maxwell's mind they appeared as physi-
cal quantities having definite quantitative relations to
other well-known physical quantities, which a physicist
can measure in his laboratory. In every creative physicist
there is hidden a metaphysicist and a poet; but the physi-
cist is less apt to persist in his occasional errors as meta-
physicist and poet, because the creations of his specu-
lative mind and of his poetical vision can be subjected
to crucial experimental tests.

Faraday's '^ Experimental Researches in Electricity,"
pubUshed in three thick volumes, looked like very long
reading. But my studies at Arran soon convinced me
that no reading is long which continually stirs up the
interest of the eager reader. Faraday was a pioneer in
science, and the descriptions of his explorations read
fike tales from a new world of physical phenomena, full
of poetical visions which his discoveries suggested to his

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 223

imagination. It must be said, however, that in spite of
his wonderful imagination and his free use of it, no in-
vestigator ever succeeded better than Faraday in draw-
ing a sharp hne of division between the new facts and
principles which he had discovered and the visions which
his imagination saw in the still unexplored background
of his discoveries. For instance, his discovery that a
perfectly definite and invariable quantity of electricity
is, as we express it to-day, attached to every valency of
an atom and molecule, expresses a physical law which
his experiments revealed and which he illuminated with
all the light of his brilliant intellect. But when this new
and precious morsel of the eternal truth had been dis-
closed by his experiments, then Faraday the scientist
stepped aside, and Faraday the poet disclosed his visions
about the constitution of matter suggested by what I
called at Arran the atomic distribution of electricity in
material bodies.

A man who discovers one of the most remarkable facts
in modern science, namely, that in every atom and mole-
cule there are definite and equal quantities of positive
and negative electricity, and that the forces between
these electricities are by far the largest known forces
which keep together the components of chemical struc-
tures, cannot, if he has the imagination of a discoverer,
refrain from asking the question: '^What is matter?"
The reader of Faraday's ^'Experimental Researches in
Electricity" rejoices whenever Faraday, the poet and
prophet, asks an apparently speculative question of this
kind, because he knows that he will be thrilled by the
poetical fancy which dictates Faraday's answer. Fara-
day's new facts and principles revealed by experiment
are steeped in the honey of his fancy; they are rich food
made delicious by the flavor of his poetical imagination,
even when that flavor leaves the ordinary mortal guessing
as to its exact meaning.

224 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Two other questions Faraday often approached in these
researches; they may be stated as follows: What is elec-
tricity? and, What is magnetism? He discovered that
motion of magnetism produces electrical forces in a man-
ner similar to that in which, according to Oerstedt's dis-
covery, motion of electricity produces magnetic forces.
This remarkable reciprocal relation between electricity
and magnetism stirs up the imagination, and makes it
eager to look behind the curtain which separates the
region of the revealed truth from that which is still un-
revealed. It was undoubtedly this eagerness of the
explorer which encouraged Faraday to approach the
questions. What is electricity? and, What is magnetism?
Faraday never gave a final answer to these questions,
but his magnificent efforts to find this answer gave birth
to new ideas which are the foundation of our modern
electromagnetic view of physical forces. One of the great
pleasures of my life has been the contemplation of the
gradual unfolding of this new view; and if in the course
of this simple narrative I succeed in describing some of
its beauties, I shall consider that this narrative was not
written in vain.

Since, as explicitly stated by Faraday, electricity and
magnetism are known by the forces, only, which they
exert, it was plain to him, as his books, '' Experimental
Researches in Electricity,'' testify, that the first question
which must be answered was the question: How are the
forces between electrical charges and between magnetic
charges transmitted through the intervening space — the
same way as gravitational forces, or are they transmitted
in a different way? In his unceasing efforts to answer
this question Faraday made a radical and fundamental
departure from the view of the natural philosophers of
his time. He stood alone and devoted a very large part
of his experimental work and of his philosophical thought
to the justification of his position. He stood alone for a

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 225

very long time, because he was formulating a radically
new physical concept which the world knows now to be
one of the mont fundamental concepts of the electro-
magnetic science of to-day; and it was difficult for his
contemporaries and for his students of forty years ago,
including myself, to understand him. In an address on
Faraday by Helmholtz, which I read during my student
days in Berlin, the following sentence refers to Faraday's
difficulty just mentioned:

It is generally very difficult to define by a general statement a new
abstraction, so that no misunderstandings of any kind can arise. The
originator of a new concept of that kind finds, as a rule, that it is much
more difficult to find out why other people do not understand him
than it was to discover the new truths.

It was very consoling to me to find out in Berlin from
no less an authority than Helmholtz that I was not the
only poor mortal who was guessing in vain about the
exact meaning of Faraday's visions.

Newton's law of gravitation enables the astronomers
to calculate accurately from a simple mathematical for-
mula the motion of celestial bodies, without any assump-
tion concerning the mechanism by which gravitational
force is transmitted from one body to another body at
a distance, say, from the sun to the earth. Newton's
formula says nothing about the time of transmission.
The action can be assumed to be direct action at a dis-
tance and therefore instantaneous. Experience seemed
to indicate that this assumption is correct, because no
detectable errors are committed when one assumes that
gravitational force travels with infinite velocity. Fara-
day refused to accept this belief in direct action at a dis-
tance for electric and magnetic forces. A few words,
only, will suffice to describe how Faraday attempted to
eliminate the belief in this direct action at a distance for
electrical and magnetic forces. These attempts will al-

226 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ways be recorded in history as the first steps in the de-
velopment of the modern electromagnetic science.

Faraday, starting from points in the electrical and in
the magnetic charges, drew nimaerous curves which in-
dicated at every point in space the direction of the elec-
tric or of the magnetic force, and in that manner the whole
space surrounding the charges he divided geometrically
into tubular filaments which he called the lines of force.
Every one of these filaments was constructed in accor-
dance with a simple rule, so that it indicated at every point
in space not only the direction but also the intensity of
the force. A specific example, often employed by me at
Arran, will illustrate this. A conducting sphere, say of
copper or brass, is charged with positive or with negative
electricity. When that charge is in equihbrimn it is, as
was well known, all on the surface of the sphere and uni-
formly distributed. Its force of attraction or repulsion,
for electrical charges in the space outside of the sphere,
is obviously along radii drawn from the centre of the
sphere. These radii, drawn in every direction and suf-
ficiently numerous, envelop httle cones the vertices of
which are at the centre of the sphere. Adjust the size
of the cones in such a way that the area of the section
of every one of them with the sphere is the same, and
make their total number proportional to the charge on
the sphere. These httle cones are then in this particular
case the Faraday lines of force, because their direction
gives the direction of the electrical force, and their nmn-
ber per unit area of the surface of any concentric sphere
is proportional to the electrical force at any point of the
surface of this concentric sphere. According to this pic-
ture there are attached to each httle element of the total
charge a definite number of these conical filaments or
lines of force, and each element of the charge on the sphere
is nothing more than the terminal of these filaments.
When the charge on the sphere is increased or diminished

b'lUDlEb AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 227

the number of these filaments is also increased or dimin-
ished proportionately, and therefore they are more
densely or less densely packed in the space which they
occupy.

Should the charge on the sphere be set in motion, then
the filaments or lines of force attached to it would also
move. Thus far I followed Faraday, but went no farther;
if I had gone just a little farther I should have met Max-
well. But, unfortunately for me, this simple picture
which I constructed, in order to aid my understanding
of Faraday's "Experimental Researches in Electricity''
over which I pondered at Arran, suggested nothing more
than a mere geometrical representation of the electrical
force which the charged sphere exerts at any point in
space. It conveyed no additional information which a
simple mathematical formula, well-known at that time,
did not convey. Additional information, however, was
added by Faraday's imagination, which introduced here
what I and many other mortals at that time considered
a strange hypothesis. He described the hypothesis at
great length in his books, and here is a brief statement
of it:

Faraday claimed that all electrical and magnetic ac-
tions are transmitted from point to point along his lines
of force; and, impelled by a remarkable intuition, he in-
sisted that his hues of force are not mere geometrical
pictures but that they had a real physical existence, and
that there was something hke muscular tension along
these Unes of force tending to contract them, and a pres-
sure perpendicular to them tending to expand them; and
that these tensions and pressures give the same numerical
value for the mechanical force between the charges as
that calculated from Coulomb's law, but with the funda-
mental difference, which Faraday pointed out, that his
hypothesis demands a definite finite time for the trans-
m.ission of electrical and magnetic forces; whereas ac-

228 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

cording to the hypothesis of direct action at a distance,
which Coulomb's law neither favors nor opposes, these
forces are transmitted instantaneously. The question of
the velocity of transmission of electrical and of magnetic
forces through space became, therefore, a crucial ques-
tion in the decision between the old view and Faraday's
view.

In a letter addressed to Maxwell in 1857, and quoted '
by Campbell, Faraday said:

I hope this summer to make some experiments on the time of mag-
netic action . . . that may help the subject on. The time must prob-
ably be short as the time of light; but the greatness of the result, if
affirmative, makes me not despair. Perhaps I had better have said
nothing about it, for I am often long in realizing my intentions, and a
failing memory is against me.

This letter was written ten years before Faraday's death,
and nothing was ever reported about the result of the
experunent planned by him. We know, however, that
the result which he expected from the experiment was
obtained thirty years later by Hertz, a pupil of Helm-
holt z.

I imagined at Arran that I could hear Faraday say:

Where the lines of magnetic force are there is magnetism, and where
the lines of electric force are there is electricity.

Faraday's answer to the questions, ^'What is electricity?"
and, "What is magnetism?" was, therefore, according to
my understanding at that time, that they were mani-
festations of force; and where these manifestations exist
there is electricity and there is magnetism, in the sense
that there are pressures and tensions which are the re-
sult of a certain state of the space which may be called
the electrical or the magnetic state. Faraday's visions,
as I found them nearly forty years ago, disclosed in his
''Experimental Researches in Electricity," went even so

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 229

far as to suggest that matter itself consists of centres of
force with Hnes of force proceeding from these centres
in every direction to infinite distances, and where these
lines are there is the body; in other words, every material
body, like every electrical and every magnetic charge,
extends to infinity by means of its lines of force ; and hence
all material bodies are in contact, explicitly denying the
existence of ether. No mortal man ever suggested a bolder
conception ! And yet to-day we know that a conception
regarding the structure of matter very similar to that
first conceived by Faraday is rapidly gaining universal
recognition, not merely as a new metaphysical specula-
tion but as the logical and inexorable demand of experi-
ment. But when Faraday told me all these strange things
as I listened attentively on the slope of Goat Fell Moun-
tain at Arran, I could not see anything in them except
geometrical pictures and a lot of what appeared to me
like pure metaphysics in the background of simple geo-
metrical structures. Although I was sure that Faraday's
metaphysics had some definite physics back of it, I was
unable to disentangle it from the hypothetical notions
which I did not understand clearly. Maxwell, I thought,
must have disentangled that physics, and I often thought
of my Scotch friend at Arran who asked me the question :
''Can you see in Faraday as far as Maxwell, the Scotch-
man, saw?"

When I came to Berlin my head was full of Faraday's
lines of force starting at electrical and magnetic charges
and winding in all sorts of shapes through space, hke
stream lines which start from the sources of a river and
follow it in its flow toward the ocean. The physical facts
and principles which Faraday discovered stood out sharply
defined like the bright stars in the firmament of a clear
and quiescent summer night; but the conception of the
new view of attracting and repelling electric and mag-
netic forces, which he represented graphically by his lines

230 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of force, endowed with strange physical powers residing
in pressures and tensions, left in my mind impressions
which made me feel that my faith in the new doctrine
was not very strong. Faith without conviction is a house
built upon sand. Helmholtz said once:

I know too well how often I sat staring hopelessly at his descrip-
tions of the lines of force, their number and their tensions.

Little I thought during my journey from Arran to Berlin
in October, 1885, that two years later all the nebulous
notions in my perplexed mind would lift like the mist
before the early rays of a sunny autumn morning. I
continued my studies of Faraday during my first year in
Berlin, reserving for that purpose the necessary time for
extra reading. What did the physicists of Berlin think,
I wondered, of Faraday's tubes or lines of force?

I went to Berlin to study experimental physics with
Hermann von Helmholtz, the famous professor of physics
at the University of Berlin, the formulator of the prin-
ciple of conservation of energy, and the first interpreter
of the meaning of color both in vision and in music and
speech. He was then the director of the Physical Insti-
tute of the university. His title, conferred upon him by
the old Emperor, was Excellenz, and the whole teaching
staff of the institute stood in awe when the name of Ex-
cellenz was mentioned. The whole scientific world of
Germany, nay, the whole intellectual world of Germany,
stood in awe when the name of Excellenz von Helmholtz
was pronounced. Next to Bismarck and the old Em-
peror he was at that time the most illustrious man in the
German Empire.

I had letters of introduction to him from President
Barnard of Columbia College, and also from Professor
John Tyndall of the Royal Institution. Professor Arthur
Koenig, the right-hand man of Helmholtz and the senior
instructor in the Physical Institute, took me to the office

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 231

of Excellenz von Helmholtz and introduced me as Herr
Pupin, a student from America, and the proposed John
Tyndall fellow of physics of Columbia College. I was
awarded the fellowship three months later. Koenig bowed
before his master as if he wished to touch the ground with
his forehead. I bowed American fashion, that is, with a
bow of the head which did not extend below my shoul-
ders, the same kind of bow which was practised at the
University of Cambridge at that time, and I called it the
Anglo-Saxon bow; it was entirely different from Koenig' s
bow. Helmholtz seemed to notice the difference and he
smiled a benevolent smile; the contrast evidently amused
him. He had much Anglo-Saxon blood in his veins;
his mother was a lineal descendant of William Penn. It
was understood in Berlin that he was the most ^'hof-
fahig" (presentable at court) scientist in the German
Empire.

He received me kindly and showed deep interest in my
proposed plan of study. His appearance was most strik-
ing; he was then sixty-four years of age, but looked older.
The deep furrows in his face and the projecting veins
on the sides and across his towering brow gave him the
appearance of a deep introspective thinker, whereas his
protruding, scrutinizing eyes marked him a man anxious
to penetrate the secrets of nature's hidden mysteries.
The size of his head was enormous, and the muscular
neck and huge thorax seemed to form a suitable founda-
tion for such an intellectual dome. His hands and feet
w^ere small and beautifully shaped, and his mouth gave
evidence of a sweet and gentle disposition. He spoke
in the sweetest of accents, and little, but his questions
were direct and to the point. WTien I told him that I
never had an opportunity to work in a physical labora-
tory and had paid exclusive attention to mathematical
physics, he smiled and suggested that I should make up
this deficiency as soon as possible. ''A few experiments

232 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

successfully carried out usually lead to results more im-
portant than all mathematical theories," he assured me.
He then requested Professor Koenig to map out for me
a suitable course in the laboratory and to look after me.
Koenig did it, and I shall always be grateful to the sadly
deformed and extremely kind Httle man with bushy red
hair and distressingly defective eyesight, which he tried
to correct with the aid of enormous spectacles employing
lenses of extraordinary thickness. Helmholtz was always
mellow-hearted to httle Koenig, partly because, I think,
Koenig reminded him of his own son Robert, who was
deformed in hand and foot and back, but had the mag-
nificently shaped head of his distinguished father.

During my first year's study in Berlin I attended Helm-
holtz's lectures on experimental physics. They were
most inspiring, not so much on account of the many beau-
tiful experiments which were shown, as on account of the
wonderfully suggestive remarks which Helmholtz would
drop every now and then under the inspiration of the
moment. Helmholtz threw the search-hght of his giant
intellect upon the meaning of the experiments, and they
blazed up like the brilhant colors of a flower garden when
a beam of sunlight breaks through the clouds, and tears
up the dark shadows which cover the landscape on a
cloudy summer day. These lectures were attended not
only by students in physics, mathematics, and chemistry,
but also by medical students and army officers. The
official world, and particularly the army and navy, paid
close attention to what Excellenz von Helmholtz had to
say; and I had much reason to beheve that they consulted
his scientific opinions at every step. I have often been
called upon to correct the opinion that Helmholtz was a
pure scientist par excellence. There is no doubt that his
great work dealt principally with fundamental problems
in scientific theory and in philosophy; but there is also
no doubt that, like many other German scientists, he

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 233

was much interested in the appHcation of science to the
solution of problems which would advance the indus-
tries of Germany. His earliest career is associated with
his invention of the ophthahnoscope. The optical glass
industry of Germany was being developed by some of
his former students, who led the world in geometrical
optics, a part of physics to which Hehnholtz devoted
much attention in his younger days.

One day I was on my way to the institute; in front of
me walked a tall German aniiy officer, smoking a big
cigar. When we reached the entrance of the institute
the officer stopped and read a sign which said: ^^ Smoking
is strictly forbidden in the institute building." He threw
his cigar away and walked in. I recognized Crown Prince
Frederick in the officer. Two years later he became Em-
peror of Germany and ruled for ninety days. I watched
his footsteps and saw that he entered Hehnholtz's office
and stayed there over an hour. He undoubtedly con-
sulted the great scientist on some scientific problem which
was then interesting the German army and navy.

Hehnholtz's personality was overpowering and seemed
to compel one's interest in problems in which he was in-
terested, and at that time his principal interest was out-
side of the electromagnetic theory. Nevertheless, I kept
up my interest in Faraday, which interest I brought with
me from Arran; but I found no opportunity to ascertain
Helmholtz's opinion concerning Faraday. Finally the
opportunity came toward the end of my first year at the
University of Berlin.

Gustav Robert Kirchhoff, the famous discoverer, for-
mulator, and interpreter of the science of spectrum analy-
sis, and the founder of the theory of radiation, was at
that time professor of mathematical physics at the uni-
versity. He was considered the leading mathematical
physicist of Germany. His contributions to the electrical
theory occupied a very high place. The most important

234 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of these was undoubtedly his theory of transmission of
telegraphic signals over a thin wire conductor stretched
on insulated poles, high above the ground. It was a mag-
nificent mathematical analysis of the problem, and it
showed for the first time that theoretically the velocity
of propagation of these signals along the wire is equal
to the velocity of light. The university catalogue an-
nounced that he was to deliver a course of lectures on
theoretical electricity during the first term of my resi-
dence at the university. I attended the course and waited
and waited, but waited in vain to hear Kirchhoff's inter-
pretation of Faraday and Maxwell. At the close of the
semester the course ended and the electromagnetic theory
of Faraday and Maxwell was referred to on two pages
only, out of two hundred; and the part so honored was
not, even according to my opinion at that time, the essen-
tial part of the theory. In this respect the lectures were
disappointing, but nevertheless I was most amply re-
warded for my pains. I never heard a more elegant mathe-
matical analysis of the old-school electrical problems
than that which Kirchhoff developed before his admiring
classes. That was the last course of lectures which he
delivered; he died in the following year, and was succeeded
by Helmholtz as temporary lecturer on mathematical
physics.

Helmholtz was rather reserved and could not easily be
approached by his students, unless they had some physi-
cal problem or a question which was unquestionably
worthy of his attention. I made up my mind to ask him,
when suitable opportunity presented itself, why Kirch-
hoff in his lectures paid so Httle attention to Faraday
and Maxwell. It was a very significant sign of those
days and I did not understand its meaning. Professor
Koenig threw up his hands in holy horror when I informed
him of my intention, and prophesied that all kinds of dire
consequences would result from my daring proposition;

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 235

pointing out that such a question would betray a lack of
respect on my part both for Kirchhoff and for Helmholtz.
Koenig himself could not answer my question except to
say that he did not see why the German school of physics
should worry much about the English school, particularly
when there was a radical difference between the two in
the realm of the theory of electromagnetic phenomena.
I admitted that if Kirchhoff was the spokesman of the
German school then there was a radical difference,
intimating however, in the mildest possible way that,
in my humble opinion, the difference counted in favor
of the English school. I really did not know enough to
express that opinion, but I did it under provocation.
Koenig flushed up and there would have been quite a
lively verbal contest if Helmholtz had not entered my
room at that very moment, like a deus ex machina. He
was making his customary round of visits to the rooms
of his research students, in order to find out how their
work was moving along. Both Koenig and I looked some-
what perplexed, betraying the fact that we had been en-
gaged in a heated argument, and Helmholtz noticed it.
We confessed that we had had a lively discussion; when
he learned the subject of our discussion he smiled and
referred us both to an address which he had delivered
before the Chemical Society of London, five years before.
It is entitled, "Recent Developments in Faraday's Ideas
Concerning Electricity.'' The same day saw me with
two volumes of Helmholtz 's addresses in my hands ana-
lyzing his Faraday address. I felt as I went on with this
study as if the heavy mist were lifting which had pre-
vented me from seeing a clear view of Faraday's and
Maxwell's ideas. Tyndall's fame for clearing up obscure
points in physical science was deservedly great, but when
I compared Helmholtz 's interpretation of Faraday and
Maxwell with that which Tyndall gave me in his book
entitled "Faraday as Discoverer," I marvelled at Helm-

236 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

holtz's superiority. It must also be remembered that
Tyndall was for many years in almost daily contact with
Faraday; and, as I pointed out before, he must also
have had close personal relations with Maxwell during
the period of 1860-1865. To me it seemed a miracle that
Hehnholtz, a German, saw so much more clearly what
was in the minds of two great English philosophers, al-
though he never had met them personally, than did an-
other great English physicist, Tyndall, who knew Fara-
day and Maxwell personally, and one of them at least
intimately. In the article in Nature, to which Tyndall
first referred me and which Maxwell had written, will
be found the following closing paragraph:

Helmholtz is now in Berlin, directing the labors of able men of science
in his splendid laboratory. Let us hope that from his present position
he will again take a comprehensive view of the waves and ripples of
our intellectual progress, and give us from time to time his idea of the
meaning of it all.

Helmholtz 's address on Faraday was one of those com-
prehensive views of which Maxwell spoke in 1874. Now
what did Helmholtz see in Faraday and Maxwell which
other physicists, like Tyndall, and even so famous a
mathematical physicist as Kirchhoff, failed to see? It
was, I thought after a careful study of Hehnholtz 's ad-
dress, the simplest thing in the world, particularly for one
who, like myself, had been wrestling with Faraday's lines
of force, and with the hypothetical powers with which
Faraday had endowed them. So simple, indeed, that I
venture to describe it here. "But in order to make the de-
scription as brief and as simple as possible I must go back
again to the charged spherical conductor which always
rendered good service in those days when I was trying
to solve the riddle of Faraday's new physical concepts.

By means of an electrical force generated by an elec-
trical machine we can increase or diminish the charge on

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 237

the surface of the conducting sphere. Now, the charge
on the sphere increases or diminishes because the elec-
trical force generated by the machine drives through a
suitable conducting wire additional electrical charge to
the sphere, or takes it away from it. This motion of the
electrical charge through the conducting wire to or from
the sphere is the electrical current. Here comes now the
historic question: Does the electrical current stop at
the surface of the charged sphere? The old electrical
theories said ^^Yes," but Maxwell, interpreting the ideas
of Faraday, said, "No." Helmholtz was the first to tell
me that clearly and distinctly, and I understood him.

Since, according to Faraday, each particle of the charge
on the sphere carries attached to it a definite number of
filaments or lines of force, it is obvious that the rate at
which the charge on the sphere increases is, as I described
above, the same as the rate at which the number of these
lines of force are crowded into the space surrounding the
sphere. Motion of the charge to the surface of the sphere
is accompanied by a motion of the Faraday lines of force
through every surface which surrounds the charged sphere.
Since, according to Faraday, electricity is everywhere
where the lines of force are, it follows that the motion of
the lines through any surface means motion of electricity
(in the sense in which I use this word) through that sur-
face. Maxwell said, according to my understanding of
Helmholtz, that motion of electricity, as represented by
the m.otion of Faraday's lines of force, is an electrical
current just as much as the motion of electrical charges
is. Electrical charges are terminals, only, of the lines of
force; and why should the motion of the terminals be
endowed with a power which is denied to the remaining
parts of the lines of force? The principal power is, ac-
cording to Oerstedt's discovery, the generation of mag-
netism; that is, magnetic lines of force. According to
Maxwell, then, the electrical current (that is, the motion

238 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of electrical charges through conductors) does not stop
at the surface of the conductor, but continues in the non-
conducting space beyond as motion of Faraday's lines of
force, as motion of electricity. The extension of the mean-
ing of the word electrical current, just described, was,
according to Helmholtz, the cardinal difference between
the old electrical theories and the Faraday-Maxwell elec-
tromagnetic theory, and Helmholtz declared in favor of
the last. I applauded Helmholtz and took off my hat
to his clear vision of things which other people, including
myself, failed to see. But can any one blame ordinary
mortals, who were always accustomed to look upon the
electrical current as motion of electrical charges in con-
ductors, when they failed to see that the electrical current
can take place even in a vacuum where there are no elec-
trical charges at all, and therefore no motion of them?
That was the physical concept which found its way so
slowly into minds polarized by preconceived notions even
after Helmholtz 's lucid explanation. This is substantially
all there is in the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory
as I gathered it directly from the Helmholtz address.
But there is another very important element which I
ought to describe here.

A corollary of Maxwell's extension of the meaning of
electrical current, which Helmholtz did not .mention ex-
pUcitly but which I soon found in Maxwell, is this : Elec-
trical charges move because a force acts upon them ; simi-
larly the number of Faraday's Hues of force, passing
through any surface in space, increases or diminishes be-
cause there is a force acting upon them. Wherever there
is an action there is an equal and opposite reaction, accord-
ing to the most fundamental law of Newton's dynamics.
Hence space, including the vacuum, must react when
Faraday's lines of force (that is, when the electricity rep-
resented by them) move through it. But if this reaction
really exists in space, how can it be expressed? Faraday

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 239

and Maxwell devoted much thought and many experi-
mental investigations in search for a definite answer to
this question, and they found it.

Faraday showed by experiment that if the charged
sphere is immersed in an insulating fluid, say an insulating
mineral oil, or in a soHd insulator hke rubber, or even
if a piece of an insulator is brought near it, then the
reacting force for a given charge on the sphere is smaller
than when the sphere is surrounded by a vacuum; or, in
other words, hquid and sohd insulators are more perme-
able to the electrical lines of force (that is, to electricity)
than a vacuum is. Therefore, an electrical force which
is acting in order to increase the charge on the sphere
and, as a result, increase the number of lines of force
through the surrounding space, will experience the less
reaction the more permeable the surrounding medimn
is. The reaction of an insulator against the action of an
electrical force appears therefore as a reaction against
the passage of electricity, that is, of electrical lines of
force, through it. That picture of the process has stayed
with me ever since my Berlin days.

The same hne of reasoning which I followed above,
regarding electrical Hues of force, leads to similar results
with regard to the magnetic lines of force. The reaction
of the medium against an increase of the electrical and
of the magnetic lines of force through it was the second
new physical concept introduced into the electrical science
by Faraday and Maxwell.

The Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory extended
the well-known electrical and magnetic actions and reac-
tions from conductors to non-conductors, including the
vacuum. If this theory is correct, then electromagnetic
disturbances will be propagated from their source to all
parts of space, and not along conductors only, by definite
waves travelling at a definite velocity.

Maxwell's calculation showed that electromagnetic

'240 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

disturbances are propagated through insulators in the
same manner as Ught is propagated, and that, therefore,
light is in all prohahility an electromagnetic disturbance.
This is the substance of Maxwell's electromagnetic theory
of light ; it is his answer to the question : ^' What is Light ? ''

That, broadly stated, was the information which Helm-
holtz first conveyed to me in terms which I understood
clearly ; and for this service I have always been profoundly
grateful to him. He showed me that the Faraday-Max-
well electromagnetic theory was incomparably simpler
than I thought it to be, and also much more beautiful.
I do not believe that in 1881 there was another physicist
in continental Europe who could have given me that in-
formation, and perhaps not even in 188G, when I first
read that wonderful address. My friend Niven in Cam-
bridge, editor of the second edition of Maxwell's great
mathematical treatise, never volunteered to tell me how
Maxwell answered the question: ^'What is Light?"
Neither did Tyndall. I do not know whether Rayleigh
or Stokes or anybody else in Cambridge v»'hen I was there
could have done it as well as Hehnholtz did. I shall de-
scribe later an historical event which indicates that they
probably could not.

Toward the end of that semester I felt certain that I
understood Hehnholtz 's interpretation of Faraday, and
of Maxwell's answer to the question: ^^What is Light ?'^
I then m.anaged to have another discussion with Pro-
fessor Koenig. He listened most attentively to my de-
scription of the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory
as I had gathered it from Hehnholtz; and it was, as far
as I can recall it now, very similar to the description given
above. This was my first lecture at the University of
Berlin, dehvered to a very intelhgent audience of one
person, dear httle Doctor Koenig. It would have been
a signal success if I had not closed it with a tactless re-
mark, to the effect that Hehnholtz, in his Faraday ad-

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 241

dress, rejected every one of the four German electrical
theories, and declared himself in favor of Faraday and
Maxwell. Helmholtz intimated, and unfortunately I did
not hesitate to say so to Doctor Koenig, that physicists
of continental Europe had not accepted the English
theory because it was above their heads. Finally I said
that all this explained most satisfactorily why Kirchhoff
paid so little attention to Faraday and Maxwell. Koenig
looked at his watch, and, as if suddenly remembering an
important engagement, he turned on his heels and left
without his customary bow and greeting. His national
pride was evidently wounded. I regretted it deeply. I
did my best to make up with him and succeeded finally,
by admitting unreservedly that, after all, the Faraday-
Maxwell electromagnetic theory rested upon several bold
assumptions which had not yet been verified by experi-
ment. The German electrical theories also rested upon
unverified assumptions, but I said nothing about that
for fear of endangering the re-established entente cordiale
between Doctor Koenig and myself.

Excellenz von Helmholtz had left Berlin for his sum-
mer vacation; among my German fellow students at the
Physical Institute there was not much interest in Fara-
day and Maxwell. I do not know how difficult it is to
conceal a deep secret, because I never had one to con-
ceal; but I do know how hard it is to keep imprisoned in
one's heart the joy which one feels when the light of
new knowledge rises above one's mental horizon. I had
planned to visit my mother during that summer; I had
not seen her for nearly two years. Perhaps, I thought,
I might find somebody in my native Banat to whom I
could disclose the joy which I received from the revela-
tion which came to me through Helmholtz. Kos, my
teacher of fifteen years before in Panchevo, was no longer
among the living; in fact, that school was no longer in
existence, the Hungarian regime having replaced it by a

242 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Hungarian school. I would have liked nothing better
than to tell him how Maxwell answered the question:
''What is Light ?'^

In the beginning of August of that summer I was in
Idvor again, carrying with me the two volumes of Helm-
holtz's addresses. My mother received me with a heart
which she described as overflowing with blessings which
my visit and the visit of God's grace upon Idvor was
pouring into it. The golden harvest was all in, and it
was the richest that Idvor had seen for many a year;
the grapes in the old vineyards were beginning to ripen,
and the peach-trees among the rows of vines in the vine-
yards were heavily loaded with the juicy fruit of am-
brosial flavor; the melons in the endless melon patches
looked big and flourishing, and suggested that at any
moment they might burst with the fulness of their ex-
uberant prosperity. The dark-green corn-fields seemed
to groan under the heavy load of the young ears of corn,
and the pasturelands alongside of the corn-fields were
alive with flocks of sheep, carrying udders which reminded
one of the abundance of milk, cream, and cheese such as
Idvor had seldom seen. All these things my mother
pointed out to me, and she assured me that by the grace
of God she was enabled to be a bountiful hostess to me,
because she had everything in great abundance which
she knew I always liked. Melons, cooled at the bottom
of a deep well; grapes and peaches picked before sunrise
and covered up with vine-leaves to keep them cool and
fresh ; young corn picked late in the afternoon and roasted
in the evening in front of a wood fire; cream from sheep's
milk supplied by the blessed sheep the day before. All
these were sweet and dehcious things; but have you ever
tasted them when their sweetness is flavored by the love
of an indulgent mother? If you have not, then you do
not know what sweetness is. I warned my mother that

STUDIES AT UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 243

her hospitality might transform me, as three years be-
fore, into a pampered pet who would be too slow to re-
turn to Berlin. Reminding me of the story which she had
told me two years before, describing my climb up the
steep and slippery roof of Bukovala's mill in search of a
star, she said: ^^You have done much climbing during
the last two years, and I know that in your climbing you
have found several real stars from heaven. One of them
is now in Berlin and no sweets in Idvor will keep you
away from it.'' She guessed right, undoubtedly because
she observed with what joy I kept up, during that vaca-
tion, my reading of Helmholtz's addresses.

Many a night during that summer I spent in my
mother's vineyard sleeping on sheepskins under the open
sky and looking at the stars at which I looked fifteen
years before, when I helped the herdsman to guard the
village oxen during the starlit summer nights. I remem-
bered the puzzles which I tried to solve at that time con-
cerning the nature of sound and of light, succeeding in
the case of sound and failing in the case of light. I re-
joiced at the feehng that I had finally succeeded in find-
ing from Faraday and Maxwell through Helmholtz that
sound and fight resembled each other, one being a vibra-
tion of matter, and the other a vibration of electricity.
The fact that I did not know what electricity is did not
disturb me, because I did not know what matter is. No-
body knows the exact nature of these even to-day, except,
as Faraday suggested, that they are manifestations of
force. David's nineteenth Psalm, which I recited so
often fifteen years before during my training in herds-
manship, conveyed a different meaning, and so did Lyer-
montoff's line which says that ''star speaketh to star."
They certainly spoke to me during those glorious August
nights, when, covered with sheepskins, I lay in my
mother's vineyard and amid the deep silence of slum-
bering earth I fistened to their heavenly tales. The more

244 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

I listened the more I became reconciled to the idea that
the language of the stars reaches me in the same way
that human language does, when it speeds on over the
telephone wire, conveyed by vibratory electric and mag-
netic forces; except that in the transmission of the tele-
phonic message the vibratory forces glide along the con-
ducting wire, whereas the stars pour out their waves of
vibratory electromagnetic forces in ever-expanding spheres
so that they may carry the heavenly message to every
other star and to everything that lives, and to everything
that has a being. I could not help telling my mother of
my new knowledge which persuaded me that hght is a
vibration of electricity, very much Hke the vibration of
the melodious string described in the Serbian figure of
speech, familiar to her, which says:

My heart quivers like the melodious string under the guslar's bow.

She always was the most attentive audience that I
ever had, and the most responsive. Her wonderful
memory, even at that time when she was seventy years
of age, assigned to every essential event of her experience
a suitable place, so that it became a vital chord in the
symphony of her life. She never heard anything worth
hearing without responding with one of these harmonious
chords, and this was particularly true when I was speak-
ing to her. On this particular occasion, referring to my
new knowledge which I brought to Idvor from Berlin,
she reminded me of my new knowledge about hghtning
which I had acquired from my teacher Kos, in Panchevo,
some fifteen years before, and afterward tried to explain
it to my father and his peasant friends, who accused me
of heresy; and she recalled her defense of me. She sug-
gested, jokingly, that if my father and his old friends
had still been living they would perhaps accuse me again
of heresy on account of some old legends which clashed
with my new knowledge; and she assured me that she

STUDIES AT UNI\nERSITY OF BERLIN 245

would defend me again. ^^God sends sunlight," she said,
''to melt the ice and snow of the early spring, and to resur-
rect from death everything that lay lifeless in the cold
grave of the bosom of mother earth, chilled by the icy
breath of winter. The same sunlight," she continued,
''awakens the fields, the meadows, and the pasturelands,
and bids them raise the daily bread of man and beast;
it also ripens the honey-hearted fruit in orchards and
vineyards. If that is all done by the same heavenly force
which hurls the hghtning across the sombre summer
clouds pregnant with showers, and also carries, as you
say, the humble human voice over the wires between
distant peoples, then I see in it a new proof of God's in-
finite wisdom which uses one means only to do great
things as well as small. Ko che ko Bog ! WTio can fathom
the power of God !" I reminded her of her saying which
she often addressed to me when I was a boy and which
I quoted before, namely: "Knowledge is the golden lad-
der over which we climb to heaven," and asked her
whether she included in this the knowledge which I was
describing to her.

"I include every knowledge," she said, "which brings
me nearer to God; and this new knowledge certainly does.
Just think of it, my son: God has been sending his mes-
sages from star to star and, according to David, from
the stars to man, ever since the creation of Adam, em-
ploying the very same method and means which man,
imitating the divine method, is beginning to use when
he employs electricity to carry his message to a distant
friend. Your teachers who gave you that knowledge are
as wise as the prophets and as holy as the holiest saints
in heaven."

When I told her of Faraday's vision, that all things
extend to and exist in every spot of the universe at the
same time and that, therefore, all things are in perpetual
contact with each other, every star feeling, so to speak,

246 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the heart-beat of every other star and of every living
thing, even of the tiniest httle worm in the earth, she
answered:

'^ Faraday's science is that part of my rehgion which
is described in the words addressed to God by King
David :

" 'Whither shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from
thy presence?

" 'If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in
hell, behold, thou art there.'

God is everywhere, and where he is, there is every part
of his creation." Her religion taught her how to catch
the spirit of science, and I was always certain that science
can teach us how to catch the spirit of her religion.

IX

END OF STUDIES AT THE UNIVERSITY OF

BERLIN

I CONFESS that when I first arrived in Berhn I brought
with me old prejudices, which were annoying, to say the
least. The Teutonism in Prague, when I was a school-
boy there, had made lasting impressions upon my young
mind; they were with me when I landed at Castle Gar-
den. Early impressions are very persistent and cannot
be obHterated by time alone. Christian's father, the
innkeeper of West Street, and his friends, the hardy Fries-
land sailors who taught me how to handle the paint-brush,
drew me closer to the German heart, and I found it much
less grasping than I thought it was. But the Frieslander
of those days had no great love for the Prussian. Bilharz,
the ideahst of Cortlandt Street, gave me a more intimate
knowledge of the German temper, and helped much to
dispel many of my early prejudices. But Bilharz dis-
played decided dishke for the Prussians. The few Ger-
man friends whom I had during my ^^ greenhorn" days
were southern Germans, and they did not appear to be
very friendly to the idea of a united Germany under Prus-
sian hegemony. These early experiences encouraged me
in the belief that the Prussians were probably responsible
for the Teutonism which I disliked. This belief was
strengthened by Bismarck's anti-Russian and anti-Ser-
bian, but strongly pro-Austrian, policy at the treaty of
Berlin in 1878. He protested, I knew, that he would
not sacrifice the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier
for all the Balkans; but I did not believe him. Hence the

247

248 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

uncomfortable feeling of being in an enemy country, when
I first came to and settled down in Berlin.

The Teutonism of Prague, more than anything else, was
responsible for it. Racial antipathy is one of the saddest
of psychic derangements; and, although it is a repulsive
product of modern nationahsm, the world does less than
nothing to get rid of its insidious poisons. European
civilization is being destroyed by it. I suffered from its
evil effects during the early days of my hfe in Berhn.
Helmholtz, Koenig, and all the officers in the Physical
Institute showed me every kindness and consideration,
and that prevented me from turning around and speeding
back to Cambridge as soon as the first breath of the at-
mosphere of Berlin gave me an acute attack of anti-Teu-
tonism. My German landlady and her friends, as well
as the German students I met in the lecture-rooms, struck
no responsive chord in my heart, because it was out of
tune with my surroundings. I remained a stranger in a
cold, strange land. A young Scotch friend of mine, a
graduate of the University of Glasgow, appeared on the
scene, some time after I had become settled in Berlin.
He kept his promise, given me at Arran, to join me in
Berlin. He stayed at the university for one semester
only and heard lectures on Roman law. He looked Hke
a northern Apollo: tall and erect, the pink of youth
radiating from his handsome face, and the locks of purest
gold adorning a lofty brow, which made you beheve that
you were looking at a young Sir Walter Scott. His deep-
blue eyes knew of no suspicions, and his heart had never
been touched by the poison of racial antipathy. He loved
the world and the v/orld loved him. His knowledge of
German was very poor, and yet everybody loved to talk
to him. Even the stern Schutzman (policeman), stirred
up to white heat by too noisy a rendering of American
and Scotch college songs in the slumbering streets of
Berhn, was as gentle as a dove when the blue-eyed young

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 249

Scot stood in front of him and greeted him with a honey-
hearted smile. My landlady, quite an aged person, as
well as her young boarders, begged me to bring him to
dinner as often as possible. ''Yes, do bring him," said
a sarcastic young fraulein; ''you look quite human and
almost handsome when he is around." There was much
truth in what she said; the poison of racial antipathy
did not operate in me when he was present. He made
friends on every side among the German students, and
when I saw how he warmed up to them and how they
warmed up to him I began to thaw out myself. Helm-
holtz and dear little Koenig were the first persons in Ber-
lin who helped me to forget that Europe was made up
of different races who lived in eternal suspicion of each
other. After that, following the example of my Scotch
friend, I began to rid myself of the poisonous infection
which I received from the Teutonism in Prague; but it
was a slow process. Helmholtz's address on Faraday
was so warm and so generous to Faraday as well as to
Maxwell, and so wonderfully just, that I began to ques-
tion the justice of my anti-Teutonic prejudices.

The two volumes of Helmholtz's addresses and public
speeches w^hich I enjoyed so much during that summer
in my mother's vineyard made me almost repentant.
My mother knew of my anti-Teutonic sentiments and
never approved of them. One day we drove to visit my
younger sister, who lived about fifteen miles from Idvor.
On the way we passed through a large village, Echka,
having a mixed population of German, Rumanian, and
Serb peasants. There was a striking contrast in the ap-
pearance of the houses, of the people, and of their methods
of moving about in the pursuit of their daily work. The
German peasants were far ahead of the Rumanians as
well as of the Serbs. My mother called my attention to
it, but I made no comment. Presently we passed the
stately Roman Catholic church of the village, which

250 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

looked like a cathedral. It was built, I was told, by the
German peasants of Echka, and my mother told me that
it was crowded on Sundays and hoUdays, and that the
priest was a very learned and a very good man. When
we passed the Orthodox church, which was quite small
and insignificant-looking, my mother said: ^' Would you
not feel ashamed if St. Sava came down to earth again
and after seeing that splendid German church looked at
this hut which is called the Orthodox church ? But small
as it is you will never find it filled except at some weddings
or at memorial services for some departed rich person,
when people expect much feasting.^'

Again I made no comment, because I was opposed to
^^ alien intruders" myself, as some people called the Ger-
man colonists; and my mother looked disappointed. Just
then we saw two peasant girls carrying river water in
shining copper vessels. These vessels were suspended at
the ends of a long flexible staff which was nicely balanced
on the shoulder of each young carrier, so that one vessel
was in front and one behind her. The first girl was a
blonde with shppers on her feet; a simple dark-blue dress
covered her youthful figure and displayed the successive
phases of her rhythmical movement. It was synchronized
with the swinging motion of the bright copper vessels,
which moved up and down like a double pendulum, bend-
ing the flexible shaft around its point of support on the
shoulder of the fair carrier. The copper vessels, although
filled to the brim, did not spill a single drop of water;
the perfect adjustment of the swinging motion of the
carrier to that of the swinging shaft produced this ad-
mirable result. The girl, the staff, and the shining
vessels stood in a beautiful harmonic relation to each
other. They reminded one of the harmonics in a sweet
musical chord. It was a beautiful sight, and I said so.
My mother, noticing my sudden burst of enthusiasm,
sounded a warning. ^'She is a German girl," she said.

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 251

''and she certainly is lovely. Her heart and soul are in
her job. But if you find one like her in Berlin, remember
your promise; you must marry an American girl if you
wish to remain an American, which I know you do."

She evidently had become a little alarmed at the
thought that her praises of the Germans might cause my
sentiments to swing too far the other way. The second
water-carrier was a barefooted and gaudy-looking lassie,
who stepped along any old way and marked her track
with frequent splashes of water from the copper vessels.
"She is a wild Rimianian," exclaimed my mother; ''she
can dance like a Vila, but she hates her job of carrying
water. You will never find one Uke her in Berhn. The
Germans have no use for people who do not love their
daily duties." My mother was a great admirer of the
thrifty and industrious German colonists in Banat, whom
she always recommended as models to the peasants of
Idvor. When she heard my praises of Helmholtz and
my confession of racial antipathy to the Germans she
put up many powerful argimients which were most con-
vincing. They had a wonderful effect.

^\Tien I returned to Berlin from Idvor things looked
more inviting, and my landlady remarked that I looked
much more cheerful than I did a year before, when I ar-
rived from Scotland. In another year, she suggested
jokingly, I might look as cheerful as a real Prussian, par-
ticularly if I should succumb to the charms of a Prussian
beauty. Remembering the promise that I had given to
my mother about marrying an American girl, I said to
my landlady: "Never ! I have already pledged my word
to one who is nearer to my heart than any Prussian beauty
could ever be." "Ach, Herr Pupin, you have changed
most wonderfully," exclaimed the landlady, and then she
added in a whisper: "Just think of it! To get a con-
fession on the first day of your return which I could not
get before in nearly a year ! I understand now why you

252 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

were always so distant to the young ladies in my pen-
sionat.'^ But the change of feeling, speeded up by my
mother, and noticed by my landlady, was speeded up
almost as effectively by another Serb.

A Bosnian Serb with the name of Nikola had a fine
cigarette shop on Unter den Linden, the principal avenue
of Berlin. It was within a stone's throw from the Im-
perial palace, and the highest aristocracy of Berlin patron-
ized it. He was a rough diamond, and would stand no
nonsense from any prince or count. If they found fault
with his famous Turkish cigarettes he did not hesitate
to tell them to buy them somewhere else. But he pros-
pered, he said, because these German aristocrats never
resented straight talk from man to man. He laughed at
me, when I mentioned to him my suspicions and antip-
athies; and begged me to pass with him, from time to
time, an hour or so in his store, and watch his German
customers. I did, and profited much. The Prussian aris-
tocrats had no racial antipathy against a Serb, if their
apparently genuine affection for Nikola had any mean-
ing. Nikola never left them in any doubt as to his pride
of being a Serb.

Half-way between Nikola's store and the Imperial
palace was an old chop-house, called Habel, dating from
the time of Frederick the Great. Frederick's generals
always stopped there for a glass of wine, when they re-
turned from an audience with the king. The custom
persisted and was still in existence when I was a student
in Berhn. Nikola often invited me to early luncheon at
this chop-house, and there we saw the great generals
and marshals of the German Empire, sitting around a
long and separate table and taking a glass of wine after
returning from the Imperial palace, from their daily audi-
ence with old Emperor William. It was a wonderful
sight; those tall, broad-shouldered, deep-chested, brainy,
and serious-minded Teuton warriors inspired trem^endous

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 253

respect. Nikola assured me that he knew many of them
personally, they being his customers, and that as human
beings they were as gentle as doves. "Many a time I
called them down when they joked about my cigarettes,
and they submitted without a murmur. Do you call
that arrogance?" asked Nikola, throwing out his chest
and trying to look as stern and as imposing as any of the
generals present.

Once he took me to an avenue where Moltke used to
walk and showed me the great field-marshal, who was
then eighty-six years old, but still as straight as an arrow.
'^Did you ever see a more modest and thoughtful or a
more spiritual-looking man anywhere?" asked Nikola,
and I confessed that I had not. "Then stop your talk
about Prussian pride!" exclaimed Nikola. On another
occasion we walked to the park and he showed me Bis-
marck, riding on horseback, a friend and an adjutant
accompanying him. Nikola saluted him and so did I,
and Bismarck saluted back graciously. "Does he look
like a brute, or like a fool who would try to convert by
force all the Slavs into Germans?" asked Nikola, poking
fun at my anti-Teutonic suspicions. "No," said I, "I
do not think he does; in fact, I think he looks very much
like Helmholtz, except that there is much less spirituality
in his face than in that of the great scientist." "Helm-
holtz !" exclaimed Nikola, "even he would lose his saintly
expression, if he had to carry the load of the whole empire
upon his shoulders, the socialists on the top of his load
pushing it one way, and the clericals at the bottom push-
ing it the other way."

Nikola was born in Bosnia when the Turks ruled su-
preme, and hence he was not much of a scholar; but he
was a careful Ustener, and always thought through his
own head; his judgment was remarkable, I thought. He
knew who's who and what's what in Berlin better than
many a foreign diplomat there. He used to joke about

254 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

it, saying that his knowledge was expected of him, be-
cause he was the next-door neighbor of the great Kaiser.
The Serbs of Banat did not seriously dislike the German
colonists there, nor did the colonists dislike them, and
they delighted in speaking the Serb language. They
called each other ''komshiya," neighbor. The Serbs, in
general, use this word when they refer to a German in a
friendly way. Nikola always referred to the great Kaiser
as his '^komshiya"; many of his customers knew that
and enjoyed it hugely. They returned the compliment
and often addressed Nikola with the Serbian word ''kom-
shiya." ''Come and see my komshiya," said he one day
to me, and there I stood for the first time in front of the
Imperial palace and waited for the old emperor to show
himself at the window. He did that almost every day
about noontime when the guards marched by on their
daily parade. Presenting arms and looking straight at
the old emperor, they marched by like a single body ani-
mated by a single heart and a single soul, and they
spanked the ground with their vigorous goose-step, the
rhythmic strokes of which could be heard quite a distance
away through the ringing cheers of the enthusiastic crowd.
''Do you know what that means?" asked Nikola. I
answered "No," and he said: "It means that every Ger-
man looks up to his fatherland for orders, and the perfect
rhythm of that goose-step means that every German will
obey these orders and finish on time any job for the good
of the fatherland that may be assigned to him. It is the
symbol of German unity." That was Nikola's unique
interpretation; I never heard anybody else interpret it
that way. But Nikola had a lively imagination and he
evidently wished me to get a favorable interpretation of
everything the Germans did.

Between my young Scotch friend, my mother, Nikola,
and my professors in the Physical Institute, I soon for-
got the unpleasant memories of the Teutonism in Prague,

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 255

and Berlin no longer looked to me like a Thraenenthal, a
valley of tears, as my old friend Bilharz in Cortlandt
Street would have called it. I soon found myself enjoy-
ing warm personal friendships of German fellow students
and of the professors, and it was a very fortunate thing;
it was providential. Nothing but the love of God and
the friendship of man can give that spiritual power which
one needs in moments of great sorrow. One day in the
beginning of winter, of that year, a letter arrived from
my sister, telling me that my saintly mother was no longer
among the living. I vowed on that day that her blessed
memory should be perpetuated as far as an humble mor-
tal like myself could do it. Twenty-seven years later
the Serbian Academy of Sciences announced that the in-
come of a foundation in memory of Olympiada Pupin
would be expended annually to assist a goodly number of
poor schoolboys in Old Serbia and Macedonia.

The vanishing of a life which is an essential part of
one's own life produces a mysterious shift of the direction
of one's mental and spiritual vision. Instead of search-
ing for light which will illuminate the meaning of things
in the external physical world, as the vision of young
people usually does, it begins to search for light which
will illuminate the meaning of what is going on in the
internal w^orld, the spiritual world of our soul. The ques-
tion '^What is Light?" was no longer the most important
question of my thoughts after my mother's death. The
question '^What is Life?" dominated for a long time my
thoughts and feelings. I became introspective, and,
being a somewhat temperamental person, like most Slavs,
I might have lost my way forever in the labyrinth of all
sorts of metaphysical structures of my own creation.
Providence came to my rescue. Two American students
with aspirations in science similar to mine joined the
Physical Institute. One of them, a Harvard graduate,
the late Arthur Gordon Webster, was the very distinguished

256 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

professor of physics at Clark University; the other, a
Johns Hopkins man, Joseph Sweetman Ames, is now
the director of the physical laboratory at Johns Hopkins
and a worthy successor to the famous Henry Augustus
Rowland. Their truly American enthusiasm and directness
prevented me from relapsing into the drowsy indefinite-
ness, sometimes called idealism, of a temperamental and
sentimental Slav. They told me many wonderful tales
of the higher endeavor in science at Harvard and at
Johns Hopkins. The new Jefferson Physical Laboratory
at Harvard was a wonder, according to Webster; and
Ames never grew weary of extolling the beauties of Row-
land's wonderful researches in solar spectra, and I never
grew weary of listening to them. At times, however, I
wondered why these two men had ever come to Helm-
holtz when they were so well off at home. Ames won-
dered, too, and he returned to Rowland at the end of the
year; but Webster stayed, although in my presence he
never adniitted unreservedly that the Physical Institute
in Berlin was very much better than anything they had
at Harvard. Webster's and Ames's testimony convinced
me that the great movement in the United States for
higher endeavor in science was making rapid progress;
and I longed to finish up my studies in Berlin and return
to the United States. After my mother's death Europe
attracted me much less.

A new physical science was attracting much attention
in Germany at that time, the science of physical chemis-
try. Helmholtz was very much interested in it. I had
read his latest papers on the subject and they reminded
me of what I had seen in Maxwell's book on heat about
Willard Gibbs of Yale. I soon discovered that the alleged
German fathers of the new science were anticipated by
Gibbs by at least ten years. Remembering the charge
of De Tocqueville that the American democracy had

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 257

never done anything for abstract science, I made a care-
ful note of my find. It was a clean-cut little discovery,
I thought, and Helmholtz admitted it. He suggested
even that I might find material in it for a research lead-
ing to a doctor dissertation. I embraced the suggestion
and started an experimental research, at the same tmie
studying the theories of Gibbs, Helmholtz, and other
authorities, mostly German, on physical chemistry. The
more one penetrates the depths of any problem the more
he yields to the belief that this problem is the most im-
portant problem in the world. This happened to me;
and the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory was
shelved, temporarily, on account of my interest in physi-
cal chemistry, and particularly on account of the pros-
pect of finding there a doctor dissertation, which I finally
did.

At the end of the first semester and at Webster's sug-
gestion he and I, in the spring of 1887, went to Paris for
a short visit. We wished to see what physical science
was doing at the Sorbonne and at the College de France,
and to compare the academic world of Paris with that of
Berlin. We stayed there three weeks and learned quite
a number of novel and interesting things. The archi-
tectural beauties of Paris as well as its art galleries and
museums made a profound impression upon me. As a
record of a magnificent old civihzation Paris, I thought,
was incomparably ahead of Berlin. The spirit of La-
place, La Grange, Fourier, Ampere, Arago, Fresnel, Fou-
cault, and Fizeau was very much alive in the ancient
halls of the Sorbonne and of the College de France. The
background of a former glorious period of physical science
in France was much more impressive in Paris than the
corresponding background in Berlin. But for every one
of the great savants in physical and mathematical sciences,
who were active in Paris at the time of my visit, like Poin-
car^, Hermite, Darboux, Appell, Lippmann, one could

258 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

name several in Berlin. And there was nobody in Paris
who, in my opinion, could measure up to Helmholtz,
Kirchhoff, and DuBois Reymond. There was no states-
man there of Bismarck's caliber, and no general like
Moltke. I saw no warriors who looked like the mag-
nificent fellows whom Nikola first exhibited to me at the
long table in Habel's. General Boulanger was very much
in the limelight. I saw him at a great official reception,
and I should have felt very sorry if the destiny of France
had been intrusted to him. The physical and chemical
laboratories were rather poorly equipped and compared
unfavorably with the corresponding laboratories in Ber-
lin. The draped statues in the Place de la Concorde,
testifying to France's grief for the loss of Alsace-Lorraine,
completed the picture of Paris in my mind, which was
anything but cheerful. France, I thought, had not yet
recovered completely from her wounds of 1870-1871,
and I felt sorry. Two years earlier I had passed through
Paris on my way from Pornic to Idvor and had carried
away a much more cheerful picture. But at that time my
observations, covering barely two days, did not see much;
and, besides, I did not know Berhn at that time and could
make no comparisons. If Paris reflected the spirit of
France and Berlin that of Germany, then France, I
thought, was a falcon with broken wings and Germany
was a young eagle that had just discovered the wonder-
ful power of its pinions. The wonderful intellectual and
physical vigor of the new empire impressed powerfully
every foreign student at the University of Berlin when
I was a student there. This gave me much food for
thought and I searched for explanations.

There was one explanation which always appealed to
me much on account of its simpUcity. I heard it from a
very learned German. This was his story: The German
iron always contained phosphorus, including also the
great deposits of iron w^hich the Germans had found in

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 259

Alsace-Lorraine. The only good iron that Geraiany had
prior to 1880 was that in the Iron Chancellor. Hence,
Germany could not build up a steel industry, and without
it no great industrial development is possible in any coun-
try. A miracle happened; a young Englishman, a clerk
in a London police court, made a discovery which was
destined to give Germany its great steel industry. This
was Sidney Gilchrist Thomas, who discovered the so-
called ^' basic Bessemer" process. It made iron containing
phosphorus easily available for the manufacture of iron
and steel products. This started the modern steel in-
dustry of Germany in the early eighties. Many a street
in the towns of the German steel districts was named in
honor of Gilchrist Thomas. ^^This," said my informant,
"is the power which, as you express it, the young German
eagle has discovered in its pinions." I suspected that the
object of his story might have been to discourage an opin-
ion on my part that the remarkable vigor of Germany
was derived from the weakness of France. Hence I looked
up the data of his story, but I found them correct. Years
ago I told this story to the late Andrew Carnegie, and he
agreed with my German informant. To-day I am con-
vinced that neither the great works of Krupp, nor the
great German navy, nor many other things which have
happened since my Berlin days, would have been possible
without the start which was made with the aid of Gil-
christ Thomas.

Another remarkable assertion from the same informant
made a lasting impression. According to him, united
Germany would not have endured very long, if it had
not been for the rapid rise of the German steel industry
and of other German industries which followed in its
wake. The organization of Germany as an economic
unit secured the organization of Germany as a pohtical
unit. He summed it up by saying that Bismarck and
Moltke had raised the structure of the German Empire,

260 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

but that Gilchrist Thomas had built a steel ring around
it which prevented it from falling to pieces. He added
then a corollary to this startling statement, and I repeat
it here in the form of a question. If the scientific research
of a young clerk in a London police court, who studied
chemistry in a London evening school, could do so much
for Germany, how much can one reasonably expect from
the great research laboratories of the German universi-
ties and technical schools? This, according to my in-
formant, had become a national question in Germany.
This information reminded me that the great movement
in Great Britain and in the United States for higher scien-
tific research was also present in Germany, but in a much
more advanced form. My informant called my attention
to Werner von Siemens's pioneer work in this German
movement.

Ernst Werner von Siemens was at that time, next to
Helmholtz, the most admired scientist in the German
Empire. He was the head of a great electrical plant in
the heart of Berlin, and was known everywhere to possess
a splendid combination of talents in abstract science and
engineering. Men of that type were quite rare in those
days, and they are very rare even to-day. I heard a great
deal about him in a course of lectures on electrical en-
gineering which I attended at the Polytechnic School of
Berlin. I saw him several times, when he called at the
Physical Institute on his friend and relative by mar-
riage, Excellenz von Helmholtz. His remarkable appear-
ance made a strong impression upon me, and I longed to
see his great plant, where all kinds of electrical things
were made, from the finest electrical precision instruments
to the largest types of djnaamos and motors, many of
them his own inventions. As a sign of special favor Helm-
holtz gave me a note of introduction to his distinguished
friend, who received me graciously and gave me to an
official who took me around the great electrical plant,

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 261

the first that I had ever seen. The inipression which it
made upon my mind was certainly wonderful, but not
more wonderful than the impression which the great
personality of Siemens had made upon me. The more I
learned about him the more I became convinced that
no industrial organization ever had a presiding genius
of greater attainments than Siemens. His attitude toward
abstract science and its relation to the industries is best
described by mentioning here a fact which is of great
significance in the history of physical science. He founded
in that year, 1887, the great Physical-Technical Institute,
and presented it to the German nation; Helmholtz was
its first president. The modern science of radiation rests
upon a foundation first laid by Kirchhoff and greatly
strengthened by additional experimental data obtained
in this institute under the guidance of Hehnholtz. Planck,
the successor of Ivirchhoff at the University of Berlin,
already in office before I left Berlin, was undoubtedly
inspired by these experiments when he formulated his
great law of radiation which forms to-day the last word
in the science of radiation, a great science which justly
bears the mark ^'made in Germany," just as the electro-
magnetic theory bears the mark ^'made in England."
The Physical-Technical Institute will always stand as a
memorial to the man who preached in Germany the doc-
trine of the closest co-operation between abstract science
and the industries. Germany adopted it first; the United
States adopted it many years later. Helmholtz and Sie-
mens always represented to me the highest symbol of
this co-operation.

Bismarck and Moltke, Helmholtz and Siemens, were
the great power which the young German eagle had dis-
covered in his pinions; and he flew as he had never flown
before, and his flight astonished me when I was a student
in Berlin. He who wants to know the real Germany of
the eighties should study the lives of Bismarck and

262 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Moltke, of Helmholtz and Siemens. They, I firmly be-
lieved at that time, were the leaders of the German con-
structive thought and action; they were the fathers of
united Germany just as Washington and Hamilton, Frank-
lin and Jefferson, were the fathers of this country. But
would the spiritual influence of the fathers of united Ger-
many produce a German Lincoln? I knew the historical
background of the Declaration of Independence and also
its historical foreground too well to answer this question
in the affirmative. Extraordinary men can do extraor-
dinary things, but the course of a nation's destiny will
always be guided not by transient efforts of one or even
of several extraordinary men of a given period, but by
the persistent power of the nation's traditions.

My visit to Paris was to supply me with more knowl-
edge of the academic world of France, and also with some
fresh food for thought relating to my problem in phys-
ical chemistry, and it did in a measure. But the current
of thought which was started by some of the strongest
mental stimuli which I received in Paris had nothing to
do with either physical chemistry or with academic
France; it ran into German channels which I described
above. These were the channels which ran through the
minds of most university men in Germany, and in these
channels every problem in art, science, and literature was
viewed at that time from the standpoint of German eco-
nomic and pohtical unity. My German scientific friends,
particularly those in eastern Prussia, where I spent the
summer vacation of 1887, would rather discuss those
problems than the problems in physical chemistry or in
the electromagnetic theory. It took me some time after
my return from Paris to get back completely to my re-
search in physical chemistry. But no sooner had I gone
back to it than the irresistible power of the current of big
events, following each other in quick succession, took me
away from it again. I shall describe them in their his-

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 263

torical order, but only in so far as they are related to the
main thread of my narrative.

One of the many sources of inspiration at the Uni-
versity of Berlin was the Physical Society which met
once a month at the Physical Institute. The research
students of the institute were admitted to these meet-
ings, and one can imagine what an inspiration it was to
them to see and to hear the scientists like Kirchhoff, the
great mathematical physicist, DuBois Reymond, the
great physiologist, Hoffman, the great chemist, and Helm-
holtz, the greatest of them all. I often imagined while
attending these meetings and listening to the learned
remarks of these scientific giants, that I was a lucky mor-
tal who by some strange accident had found himself sud-
denly among the great heroes in Walhalla. Helmholtz
usually presided, and his impressive physiognomy sug-
gested a Wotan presiding at a gathering of the Teuton
gods in Walhalla. Whenever I hear Wagner's Walhalla
motif I am reminded of those memorable scenes in the
Physical Institute in Berlin, the scenes of victory of the
immortal mind of man over mortal matter.

At one of those meetings, which took place toward
the end of 1887, many scientific giants of the university
were present and Hehnholtz presided. There was an
atmosphere of expectancy as if something unusual was
going to happen. Helmholtz rose and looked more solemn
than ever, but I noticed a light of triumph in his eyes;
he looked like a Wotan gazing upon the completed form
of heavenly Walhalla, and I felt intuitively that he was
about to disclose an unusual announcement, and he did.
Referring to Doctor Heinrich Hertz, a former pupil of
his and at that time professor of physics at the Technical
High School in Karlsruhe, Helmholtz soleimily announced
that he would describe some remarkable experimental
results which Hertz had obtained by means of very rapid

264 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

electrical oscillations. He then described in his inimitable
way a preliminary report which Hertz had sent him,
pointing out, in a most lucid manner, the bearing of these
experiments upon the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic
theory, and affirming that these experiments furnished
a complete experimental verification of that remarkable
theory. Everybody present was thrilled, particularly
when Helmholtz closed with a eulogy of his beloved pupil,
Hertz, and with a congratulation to German science upon
the good fortune of adding another ^'beautiful leaf to its
laurel wreath." That thrill soon reached the physicists
in every physical laboratory in the world; and for a num-
ber of years after that memorable announcement most
investigators in physics were busy repeating the beauti-
ful Hertzian experiments. The radio of to-day is an off-
shoot of those experiments.

This is no place to go into a detailed description of
what Hertz did. The fundamental idea underlying his
beautiful research and its relation to the Faraday- Max-
well far-reaching electromagnetic theory can be described
in very simple terms. The wonderful achievements of
radio broadcasting alone, to say nothing of other much
more important achievements, demand this description.
That idea, like the tiny seed hidden in a beautiful flower,
lay hidden in Faraday's visions and in Maxwell's won-
derful, but, to most ordinary mortals, enigmatic inter-
pretation of them. Hertz, guided by his great teacher,
Hehnholtz, caught the hidden seed and out of it grew a
physical embodiment of the Faraday-Maxwell theory,
represented by ideally simple apparatus, operating in an
ideally simple way. The apparatus and its operation are
now the heart and soul of a new art, the radio art, a
beautiful daughter of the beautiful mother, the Faraday-
Maxwell electromagnetic science. The following descrip-
tion of Hertz's apparatus and of its operation was the
theme of popular lectures and of many conversations

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN

265

which I had with my friends who were not physicists
by profession. It represents quite closely the simple
picture which I carried away in my mind from that memo-
rable meeting of the Berlin Physical Society thirty-six
years ago.

Two equal metal spheres A and B, each twelve inches in diameter,
and each carrying copper rods C and D, are placed as indicated in
the diagram given here. At E is an opening of about three-tenths

/

\ i / y

\ \ I /
\ \ I / y

/

\ \ \\[^/y"^- .^'- --^"-^ \\A_lf ^ / /

I \ vf--- 1> / • '

/

./

THE HERTZIAN OSCILLATOR

of an inch in length, the so-called air-gap. By means of two wires
e and /, connected to an electrical machine, the spheres are charged,
one receiving a positive electrical charge denoted by the (+) sign, and
the other a negative one, denoted by the (— ) sign. The air-gap E
insulates one sphere from the other, and its function is to make it pos-
sible for the electrical machine to increase the two charges until a very
high electrical tension is reached. When the electrical tension between
the two charges, acting through the air-gap E, is sufficiently high,
then the insulating power of the air-gap is overstrained and suddenly it
breaks down and becomes conductive and permits the two charges to
rush toward each other. The conductivity of the air-gap suspends the
action of the charging machine. A large current passes then between

266 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the two spheres along the rods and through the air-gap E which is
heated by the current to white heat. It becomes then a very good
conductor and permits the charges to pass through it easily. The
collapse of the air-gap is reported by the sharp crack of the electrical
spark which is due to the very sudden heating and expansion of the
air in the air-gap produced by the passage of the electrical current.
It is a miniature lightning. The two charges reunite, the spheres are
discharged, and after that the air-gap E recovers quickly from its break-
down and becomes an insulator again. The process is then repeated
by the action of the machine and a rapid succession of sparks can be
maintained, each one of them announcing by the crack of the spark
the reunion of the charges that had been pulled apart and forced to
the surfaces A and B by the action of the electrical generator.

All this was known long before Hertz. The first experi-
ment of this kind I saw in Panchevo in my boyhood days,
when my Slovenian teacher Kos explained to me the
theory of lightning according to the views of Benjamin
Franklin, a theory which clashed with the St. Elijah legend
of Idvor and nearly proved me guilty of heresy. But
there was something in these electrical discharges that
Benjamin Franklin did not know, and that knowledge
was first suggested by another great American scientist,
a scientist even greater than Benjamin Franklin was in
his day.

As far back as 1842 our own Joseph Henry performed
experiments similar to those performed by Hertz, and he
inferred, prophetically, that the discharge was oscillatory.
Nobody ever suggested this idea before, but Henry's
experiments permitted such an inference. Its oscillatory
character was then demonstrated mathematically in
1853 by Professor William Thomson of Glasgow, and
his calculation was proved to be correct by many experi-
mental tests covering a period of over twenty-five years,
and thus the electrical oscillator, similar to the one em-
ployed by Hertz, became a well-known apparatus.

What, then, was the novel element in the Hertzian
work? It was, broadly speaking, his demonstration that

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 267

the space surrounding the oscillator (the spheres with
their rods) participates in the electrical oscillations in
perfect agreement with the Faraday-Maxwell theory;
a participation which was foreign to all previous elec-
trical theories. In other words, he detected in the old
electrical-oscillation experiments a new action, never
detected nor even dreamed of before. He discovered the
electrical waves in the space outside of the oscillator.
Remembering the impression which Hehnholtz's lecture
on Faraday made upon my mind, I was certain at that
time that nobody in Continental Europe but one of Helm-
holtz's pupils like Hertz could have predicted that there
was in these well-known electrical oscillations a new ac-
tion, an action demanded by the Faraday-Maxwell theory.
A simple analogy will, I trust, help much to illustrate
the new action which Hertz expected when he started
out to search for an experimental test of the modern elec-
tromagnetic theory. No scientific expedition ever started
out in search of scientific treasures and returned with a
richer load.

Here is the analogy:

If by the force of our fingers we deflect the ends of the prongs of a
tuning-fork and then let go, the prongs will return to their normal
position after performing a number of vibrations of gradually diminish-
ing amplitude. The state of rest is reached when the energy of bend-
ing, produced by the work of our fingers, has been expended, partly
in overcoming the internal friction in the tuning-fork, partly in over-
coming the reactions of the surrounding medium, the air; this last
effect results in sound-waves which are radiated off into space. The
stiffness and the mass of the prongs of the fork determine the period
of vibration, that is, the pitch of the fork.

I confess that in the course of my life since my Berlin days I afforded
considerable amusement to my friends whenever I tried to explain to
them the Hertzian experiments by appealing to what I considered a
well-known action of the tuning-fork. Some of them objected on the
ground that this action is just as difficult to understand as the action
of the Hertzian oscillator. I met this objection by describing to them
the action of the reed in Serbian bagpipes which I watched when I

268 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

was a boy, and understood sufficiently well to recognize later in the
action of the tuning-fork a performance similar to that of the reed in
the Serbian bagpipes. I understood the tuning-fork because I under-
stood the reed. An educated American, I claimed, should find no
difficulty in understanding the action of a simple mechanism which
an uneducated Serbian peasant boy understood.

The Hertzian electrical oscillator, described above, acts like the
tuning-fork. The process of pulling apart the two charges, the posi-
tive from the negative, and of forcing them to the surface of the spheres
by the action of the electrical machine, is a parallel to the process of
deflecting by the pressure of our fingers the prongs of the tuning-fork
from their normal position. In one case the tuning-fork by its elastic
stiffness reacts against the bending of the prongs. In the electrical
case the electrical lines of force in the space surrounding the oscillator
react against the action of the machine which crowds them into this
space by stretching and compressing them. This is the picture of the
action of the lines of force which Faraday gave me on the island of
Arran, but I did not understand it. In the picture the dotted curves
are the Faraday lines of force and the arrow-heads indicate the direc-
tion of the electrical force. The Hertzian oscillator, and what Helm-
holtz had told me before, made Faraday's language and thoughts much
more intelligible. The work done by the machine is all expended upon
the stretching and compressing of the lines of force into the space out-
side of the spheres, that is, upon the electrification of that space.

Compare now the motion of the tuning-fork, after the pressure of
the fingers has been removed, to the electrical motion when the air-
gap has broken down and the action of the electrical generator sus-
pended. The prongs are driven back to their normal position by the
elastic reaction due to the bending; but when they reach that posi-
tion they are moving \\dth a certain velocity, and their momentum
carries them beyond that position; they move on until the energy of
the moving mass has been expended in the work of bending the prongs
in the direction opposite to that of the original bending. The prongs
begin then to move back in the opposite direction, starting the second
cycle of motion. The same line of reasoning "v\dll carry us into the third
and fourth and every succeeding cycle of motion. It is obvious that
these cycles will follow each other during equal intervals of time, which
gives a definite pitch to the tuning-fork. A periodic motion of this
type is called an oscillation or vibration; and it is clear that it is
a periodic transformation of the energy of elastic bending into energy
of motion of the mass of the prongs including the surrounding air, and
vice versa. The motion is finally reduced to rest when the energy of

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 269

bending, produced at the start by the work of the fingers, has been
used up. The question, what has become of that energy? is very im-
portant in this connection. The answer is: It is used up partly in
overcoming internal friction and partly in overcoming the reactions of
the surrounding air, which result in sound-waves. A sound-wave is a
short name describing the physical fact that in the air there are com-
pressions and dilatations alternating at periodically recurring inter-
vals. The production of sound-waves in the air is a proof that the
air in the space surrounding the tuning-fork participates in the mo-
tions of the tuning-fork.

A perfectly analogous experiment was performed by Hertz with his
electrical oscillator, and his principal object was to find whether the
electrical field, that is, the electrified space surrounding the oscillator,
reacted as did the air driven by the vibrating tuning-fork; if it did it
would develop electrical waves. If these electrical waves actually
existed, what did Hertz expect them to be? In the description of the
oscillator and of its action, given above, two things only were men-
tioned : the action of the electrical machine which charges the oscillator
and the reaction of the lines of force against the tensions and pressures
which crowd them into the surrounding space. The electrical waves
can, therefore, be nothing else than periodic variations of the tensions
and pressures in the lines of force, that is to say, periodic variations
in the destiny of the lines of force in the space surrounding the oscil-
lator. This was what Hertz had found.

The breakdown of the air-gap in the electrical oscillator and the
consequent suspension of the action of the electrical generator is analo-
gous to the removing of the pressure of the fingers from the prongs of
the tuning-fork. The electrical charges on the spheres with the lines
of force attached to them, strained by tensions and compressions, are
released, and they move toward each other through the conducting
air-gap. Just as the prongs of the tuning-fork, after the pressure of
the fingers has been removed, cannot remain in the strained position
in which they have been bent, so the electrical lines of force, after the
insulating air-gap has broken down and the action of the machine been
suspended, cannot remain in the position to which they are stretched;
they contract, and hence their positive terminals on one sphere and
the negative on the other move toward each other. The motion of
the strained lines of force with their terminals, the charges on
the spheres, has a momentum. Maxwell was the first to show that the
momentum of the moving electrical lines of force is equal to the num-
ber of magnetic lines of force which, according to Oerstedt's discovery,
are produced by the motion of the electrical lines of force.

270 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

The motion of the electrical lines of force has not only momentum
but also energy. Employing Faraday's mode of expression we can
say that the electrical energy of the stretched electrical lines of force
is thus transformed into energy of the electrical motions. This is per-
fectly analogous to the passage of the elastic energy of the bent prongs
of the tuning-fork into the energy of motion of the moving mass of
these prongs. Again, just as the momentum of the moving mass of
the tuning-fork bends the prongs in the opposite direction and con-
tinues this bending until that motion has disappeared, so the momen-
tum of the moving electrical lines of force will stretch again the elec-
trical lines of force and continue this stretching until the energy of
motion has disappeared, when the two spheres are charged again, but
in the direction which is opposite to that in the beginning. A new
cycle of electrical motion is then started again by the stretched elec-
trical lines of force, repeating itself in an oscillatory fashion until the
original electrical energy, produced by the charging electrical ma-
chine, has disappeared.

But where has the energy gone? This question is just
as important in this case as it was in the case of the tuning-
fork. The old electrical theories answered this question
one way, and Maxwell, inspired by Faraday, answered
it in another. The old theories maintained that there
is no other electrical motion except the motion of the
charges along the conducting surface of the spheres and
the rods. They paid no attention to the motion of the
lines of force, because they knew nothing about them.
Their vision did not see the Hues themselves but only
their terminals, the charges. Hence, according to the
old theories, all of the energy imparted by the machine
is transformed into heat in the conducting parts of the
oscillator.

Hertz was the first to prove that a part of the energy
is radiated off into space, in a similar manner as the energy
of a tuning-fork is radiated off in the form of sound waves.
He detected in the space surrounding the oscillator the
presence of electrical waves, that is, periodically recurring
variations of the density of the electrical lines of force;
he measured their length, and, having calculated the

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 271

period of his oscillator, he divided the wave-length by
the period and obtained the velocity of propagation. It
came out, in his earliest experiments, roughly equal to
the velocity of light, as the Faraday-Maxwell theory
had predicted. The waves were reflected and refracted
by insulators denser than air, and all these and other
effects Hertz demonstrated to follow the laws which hold
good for light, supporting admirably Maxwell's theory
that light is an electromagnetic disturbance. Even this
preliminary report which Hertz had sent to Helmholtz
convinced everybody that the Faraday-Maxwell elec-
tromagnetic theory had triumphed, and that our knowl-
edge of electromagnetic phenomena had been wonder-
fully extended. Subsequent experiments by Hertz and
others added more and more laurels to this first victory.

That meeting of the Physical Society in Berlin was
what I always considered the inauguration day of the
electromagnetic theory. Prior to that day the theory
existed in all its beautiful completeness, but it dwelt on
high in the celestial heights of Faraday and Maxwell.
Continental physicists needed the guidance of a Helm-
holtz to reach these heights. After that day it came down
to earth and lived among mortal men and became part
of their mode of thought. It was a heavenly gift which
Hertz brought down to earth. Everybody was convinced
that the science of light had become a part of the science
of electricity.

This new knowledge was the second great revelation of
the nineteenth century. The wonderful things which followed
in its wake, even before the nineteenth century had closed,
testify to the greatness of that revelation.

I have often asked myself the question, Why did not
our Joseph Henry, who discovered the oscillatory elec-
trical motions and operated with apparatus similar to
that employed by Hertz, pursue his studies further than
he did in 1842? and why did not Maxwell, the formulator

272 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of the modern electromagnetic science, perform those
ideally simple experiments which Hertz performed? The
knowledge of the electrical oscillator was the same in
1865 as in 1887, and Maxwell undoubtedly had that knowl-
edge. History offers an answer to these questions and
this answer throws a splendid light upon the character
of these two great scientists.

Soon after 1842 Joseph Henry resigned his professor-
ship at Princeton College, and bade good-by to his labora-
tory where he had made several of his splendid discoveries,
and where in 1832 he had constructed and operated the
first electromagnetic telegraph, one of the practical results
of his great discoveries. This happened long before Morse
had ever been heard of. Henry's fame among men of
science was very great and promised to grow even greater
if he continued his scientific researches. He was still in
his prime, only a few years over forty. But a patriotic
duty called him to Washington, where the Smithsonian
Institution waited for his skilled hand to organize it
and to defend it against the scheming politician. This
duty tore him away from his beloved laboratory, and
he spent the rest of his life, over thirty years, in Wash-
ington as secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, as
originator of most of the national scientific bureaus of
which this country is proud to-day. He was also the first
president of the National Academy of Sciences, char-
tered by Congress in 1863, thanks to his efforts. Physical
science under his leadership had rendered valuable ser-
vice to the country during the Civil War, and the con-
gressional charter to the National Academy of Sciences
was a graceful recognition of this service. I have already
pointed out Joseph Henry's splendid efforts for the ad-
vancement of scientific research in this country and shall
return to it later. He was a great scientist, but he was
also a great patriot; his country stood first and his own
scientific achievements and fame stood second in his

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 273

heart. That, I am sure, was the reason why he did not
pursue any further than he did his researches of electrical
oscillations. I will mention here that one of the most
gratifying results of my humble efforts was the naming
of an electrical unit after his name. My colleague, the
late Professor Francis Bacon Crocker of Columbia Uni-
versity, joined me most enthusiastically in these efforts;
and the Electrical Congress in Chicago in 1893, at which
Helmholtz presided, adopted the name Henry as the
unit of electrical inductance; the unit Farad was named
in honor of Faraday. No other electrical units are in
more frequent use than the Farad and the Henry, par-
ticularly in the radio art. No other men contributed to
this art as much as Faraday and Henry did.

Maxwell resigned his professorship at King's College,
London, at the end of 1865, soon after he had communi-
cated to the Royal Society his great memoir on the elec-
tromagnetic theory. The electromagnetic theory of
light which, as I pointed out before, he had called '^ great
guns" in a letter addressed to a friend, was the climax
of it. He retired to his country place, Glenlair, in Scot-
land, and for five years he was free to devote his entire
time to study and meditation. That was the highest
joy of his life. But the Duke of Devonshire, a loyal Cam-
bridge man, had presented the university with a goodly
sum of money for the building and equipment of a phys-
ical laboratory. It was to be named the Cavendish labora-
tory, after Lord Cavendish, the Duke's illustrious ancestor,
who had devoted his life to electrical science. This gift
was the Duke's response to the Cambridge movement
in favor of scientific research. Maxwell was called to
Cambridge to become the director of the new laboratory,
and he responded, knowing well that, from that moment
on, most of his time would be devoted to organization
and administration. Duty to his university, and to the
cause of scientific research in Great Britain, stood higher

274 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

in his heart than the experimental demonstration of his
great theory; that was certainly one of the reasons why
Maxwell did not perform those ideally simple experi-
ments which Hertz performed. But as director of the
Cavendish laboratory he had trained a number of men,
in order to prepare them to push on the line of advance
where he had left it; and one of them, in particular, was
soon to take the leadership in the rapid development of
the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory.

The examples of Henry and of Maxwell must have
been in Andrew White's mind when in 1873 he spoke
those m.emorable words which I quoted before and will
quote here again :

I will confine myself to the value, in our political progress, of the
spirit and example of some of the scientific workers of our day and
generation. What is the example which reveals that spirit? It is an
example of zeal, ... of thoroughness, of bravery, ... of devotion to
duiy without which no scientific work can be accomplished, ... of
faith that truth and goodness are inseparable.

The Hertzian experiments created quite an upheaval
in the research programme of the Physical Institute;
everybody seemed anxious to drop his particular subject
of research and try his hand at the Hertzian waves. Sev-
eral candidates for the doctor's degree yielded, but I
resisted and returned to my problem in physical chemis-
try, and plodded along as if nothing had happened. I
was very anxious to finish my research, get my doctor's
degree, and return to the United States. But I soon
found out that there are currents in human life which
can influence the course of life of a young scientist much
more powerfully than even a new and powerful current
of thought in physical sciences.

During the first two months of 1888, Nikola, the Bos-
nian Serb, began to look worried. He informed me con-
fidentially that he had received bad news about the health

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 275

of his great ^'komshiya/' the aged Kaiser. The audiences
at the palace were separated by longer and longer inter-
vals, and Habel's long table began to look deserted; the
old generals with their splendid uniforms v/ere conspicu-
ously absent and the historic chop-house began to look
commonplace. The daily parades of the guards were
finally suspended, and there were no expectant crowds
in front of the Imperial palace. The gay life of Unter
den Linden became very much subdued. Finally the
historic event occurred: the great emperor died on March
9, 1888. Berlin went into mourning and prepared for a
funeral such as Germany had never seen before. ^^I have
secured a balcony for you and your friends right over my
store," said Nikola; ''I want you and your friends to see
the funeral procession as my guests." His grief over the
death of the old emperor was really pathetic. He wanted
me and my American friends to see the great procession
which, according to his gloomy forebodings, was to mark
the first step downward in the wonderful development
of the German Empire. When, consohng him, I pointed
out the well-known virtues of Crown Prince Frederick,
he took hold of his larynx and his gesture indicated that
he expected the death of the Crown Prince from his in-
curable malady. ^^What then?" I asked him. He an-
swered: '^Ask your Bismarck and Moltke, Helmholtz
and Siemens; they are your oracles, perhaps they can
answer your question; no ordinary mortal can."

Nikola had never met my American friends whom he
mentioned in his invitation, but he had heard a great
deal about them. My classmate at Columbia, A. V. Wil-
liams Jackson, now the distinguished Orientalist and pro-
fessor at Columbia University, was at that time at the
University of Halle, studying with the great Orientalist,
Professor Geltner. He had visited me in Berlin and I
returned his visit by spending with him a week-end at
Halle. This was shortly before the great Kaiser's death.

27G FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Jackson's mother and two sisters were there on a longer
visit, and for two days I felt that I was back in New York
again, and I was supremely happy. On the way back to
Berlin I could not dismiss from my mind the memory
of my mother's words: ^'You must marry an American
girl if you wish to remain an American, which I know you
do." Ever since my return from Halle, I could hear these
words ringing in my ear no matter where I was, in my
lodgings, in the laboratory, in the lecture-rooms, or even
in Nikola's store. Nikola had read my thoughts, and
when he mentioned my American friends he meant Jack-
son and his mother and sisters at Halle. Well, they came,
they saw, and they conquered. One of Jackson's sisters
went to Italy during that spring and I followed; she re-
turned to Berlin to join her mother and I followed; she
went to the island of Norderney, in the North Sea, to
spend a part of the summer season, and I followed. The
Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic theory and the Hert-
zian experiments, my research in physical chemistry, and
the learned essays of Helmholtz and Willard Gibbs, and
of all the other fathers of physical chemistry, disappeared
from my mind as if they had never been there. The only
problem that could find a place there was the question:
Will she accept me? She finally did, and I made a bee-
Hne for New York, in order to find out how soon I could
get a job there.

The Columbia authorities were organizing at that time
a new department in the School of Mines, the Depart-
ment of Electrical Engineering, and they were glad to
see me and consult me about it. It was to start its work
a year from that time, that is, the end of September,
1889. I was offered a position in it as ^^ Teacher of Mathe-
matical Physics in the Department of Electrical En-
gineering." A very long title, indeed, but such it was
and an interesting bit of history is attached to it. I ac-
cepted gladly and hurried back to Europe proud as a

END OF STUDIES AT BERLIN 277

peacock. My fianc6e and her family met me in London
and I was married in the Greek church, according to the
rites of the Orthodox faith the faith of my mother and
of all my ancestors.

^'Marriage gives that fulness to life which nothing else
can give," said Helmholtz when I saw him again in Berlin
and informed him that I was married and that I had been
promised an academic position at Columbia College. He
approved my dropping the experimental research and
substituting in its place a mathematical research in phys-
ical chemistry. This research was finished in the early
spring and I sent it to Helmholtz who was then in Baden-
Baden. He telegraphed: ^^ Your successful effort approved
and accepted.'' Never before nor since did I ever receive
a telegram which made me more happy. The examina-
tions gave me no serious trouble, and in the late spring
of that year I had my doctor's degree and became a citi-
zen in the world of science. The three theses which,
according to old German custom, every candidate seek-
ing promotion to the dignity of a doctor of philosophy
must frame and defend publicly are given here, in order
to show my final mental attitude which was formulated
by my scientific studies in Europe.

I. Instruction in Physics in the preparatory schools
should be as much as possible a practical one.

II. The Thermodynamic methods of Gibbs, von Helm-
holtz, and Planck form the most reliable foundation for
the study of those physical processes which we cannot
analyze by ordinary dynamics.

III. The Electromagnetic Theory of Light deserves
more attention than it has received so far in university
lectures.

Usually these theses, appended to German doctor dis-
sertations, are not taken very seriously either by the
candidate, who is to be promoted, or by anybody else.
But I took my theses very seriously. The first summed

278 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

up President Barnard's doctrine relating to scientific
instruction, which I described before in connection with
my description of the American movement favoring scien-
tific research in American colleges and universities; the
second summed up my admiration for the new science of
physical chemistry first started by our own Josiah Wil-
lard Gibbs; and the third summed up my love for the
Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic science. On these
three questions in physical science I had, I thought, quite
clear and definite ideas; and that gave me much confidence
that I was about to return to the- United States sufficiently
equipped to render service in return for some of the many
favors which I had received.

As the ship which carried me back to the United States
entered New York Harbor I saw on my right Castle Gar-
den ; it looked the same as it did fifteen years before, when
I first entered on the immigrant ship, and it reminded me
of that earlier day. I said to my bride, who was stand-
ing by my side, that I did not carry much more money
into New York Harbor than I did fifteen years before,
when I first looked upon Castle Garden, and yet I felt
as rich as a Croesus. I felt, I told her, that I owned the
whole of the United States, because I was sure that the
United States owned me; that I had an ideal American
bride, who had assured me that I had lived up to the
standards of an ideal American bridegroom; and that I
had a fine position in a great American institution and
strong hopes of filling it to everybody's satisfaction. I
enumerated all these and other things to my bride and
wound up by saying, jokingly: ^^I have also some pros-
pects which modesty prevents me from mentioning,"
and then I added: ''These are the only worldly goods
with which I thee endow."

X

THE FIRST PERIOD OF MY ACADEMIC
CAREER AT COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

The new ^'Department of Electrical Engineering in
the School of Mines of Columbia College" had announced
its courses of instruction quite a number of months be-
fore I arrived in New York. The late Francis Bacon
Crocker, at that time the newly appointed instructor in
electrical engineering and my future colleague and life-
long friend, had been consulted with regard to these
courses, and he was most liberal to the theoretical side,
which was to be my share of the instruction. He attached
much importance to the fundamental theory, although
he was a practical engineer. The new department was
to be independent of the other scientific departments.
We had some difficulty, however, in maintaining that
independence; the older departments of engineering
showed a disposition to claim some right of guardianship
over the new infant department. For instance, many
chemists thought that electrical engineering was largely
chemistry on account of the storage batteries, the galvanic
cells, and the electrochemical processes which formed an
important part of the electrical operations in the early
history of applied electricity. Others asserted that, since
mechanical engineering attended to the design and the
construction of electromagnetic generators and to the
power plant which furnished the driving power, electrical
engineering was, therefore, largely mechanical engineer-
ing.

Crocker and I maintained that there is an electrical
science which is the real soul of electrical engineering,

279

280 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

and that every other abstract science or its application
was an incident only in electrical engineering. We won
out in spite of the fact that at other institutions of higher
learning in the United States electrical engineering was
taught in the departments of physics or of mechanical
engineering. But it was not an easy matter in those days
to persuade people that the electrical science with its
applications was then, or that it ever would be, big enough
to need a department of its own, like, for instance, civil
engineering.

A small brick shed, a temporary structure, had been
built at Columbia College to accommodate the new de-
partment. The students called it the ^'cowshed," and
the boy who invented the name did not indulge in any
stretching of his imagination. It certainly looked like a
cowshed. The laboratory equipment consisted of a
dynamo, a motor, and an alternator, with some so-called
practical measuring instruments. When I compared the
facihties of the new ''Department of Electrical Engineer-
ing at Columbia College" with that of the Polytechnic
School in Berlin, I felt somewhat humbled, but not dis-
couraged. I said to Crocker: ''Our guns are small and
few in number; the men behind the guns will have to ex-
pand much beyond their present size if this department
is to make any impression upon the electrical art.'^
"Pupin," said Crocker, "you have no idea how rapidly
a young fellow grows when he tries to teach a new sub-
ject to poorly prepared beginners."

Crocker and I were given to understand that any ad-
ditional equipment during the first year would have to
be bought from contributions outside of the university.
We raised some money by giving a course of twelve popu-
lar lectures for which we charged ten dollars per person.
Each lecture lasted two hours ; we were somewhat dubious
about their quality, and so we provided a generous quan-
tity. We raised in this manner three hundred dollars

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 281

and bought additional equipment, but no two young
scientists ever worked harder to earn three hundred dol-
lars. The experience, however, was worth many times
that amount. Our audience consisted of business men
and lawyers, who were either interested in the electrical
industries, or expected to become interested. They had
hardly any previous scientific training. It took much
judgment and skill to talk science to these people without
shooting much above their heads. Every one of them
believed that the electrical science was in its infancy,
and that most of its useful applications were obtained
empirically by a rule of thumb. When we told them
that the electrical science was one of the most exact of
all physical sciences, some shook their heads and exhibited
considerable scepticism. One of them asked me: ^^ Doc-
tor, do you know what electricity is?^' ^^No," said I,
and he added another question: ^^Then how can you have
an exact science of electricity when you do not even know
what electricity is?" To this I retorted: ^^ Do you know
what matter is ? Of course you do not, nor does anybody
else know it, and yet who will deny that there are exact
sciences relating to material things? Do you deny that
astronomy is an exact science?" It is a difficult thing
to make unscientific people understand that science stud-
ies first and foremost the actimties of things and not
their ultimate nature.

In that first course of public lectures I found it neces-
sary to devote much of my exposition to the correction
of erroneous notions lodged in the minds of my audience.
When I told that audience that no electrical generator
generates electricity, because electricity was made by
God and, according to Faraday, its quantity in the uni-
verse is constant, and that for every positive charge
there is an equal negative one, most members of my audi-
ence were inclined to think that I was talking meta-
physics. ^'Then what does it generate?" asked one of

282 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

my hearers. I answered: '^It generates motion of elec-
tricity, and by that motion it furnishes us with means
of doing useful work Hke telegraphy, telephony, and elec-
trical lighting." Then I added: ^^The electrical science
studies the forces which make electricity move against
the reactions of the bodies through which it moves; in
the overcoming of these reactions the moving electricity
does useful work." Illustrations from dynamics of ma-
terial bodies did not help very much, because my audi-
ence had hardly any knowledge of even the elements of
Newton's great work, although Newton considered these
elements obvious truths. All they knew about Newton
was that he had '^discovered gravitation." When I
told them that Newton had discovered the law of gravi-
tational action and not gravitation itself, they thought
that I was splitting hairs. I was never quite sure that
those good people had carried away much knowledge
from my lectures, but I was quite sure that they had
left much knowledge with me. In trying to straighten
out their notions I straightened out my own very con-
siderably. Crocker was right when he said: ''You have
no idea how rapidly a young fellow grows when he tries
to teach a new subject to poorly prepared beginners."
That was the real profit from our first course of public
lectures.

Every cultured person is expected to have an intel-
ligent view of literature, of the fine arts, and of the social
sciences, which is as it should be. But who has ever
thought of suggesting that culture demands an intelligent
view of the primary concepts in fundamental sciences?
If cultured people had it, there would be no need to re-
new periodically the tiresome topic of the alleged clash
between science and religion, and there would be much
more straight thinking about things in general. Every
child in the public schools should be made perfectly fa-
miliar with the simple experiments which illustrate the

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 283

fundamental elements of Newton's divine philosophy,
as Milton calls science. Barnard, Joseph Henry, Andrew
White, and the other leaders of scientific thought in the
United States, who started the great movement in favor
of higher scientific research and of a better scientific edu-
cation, had a difficult up-hill pull, because people in high
places lacked an intelligent view of science. A famous
lawyer, a trustee of a great educational institution, looked
surprised when I told him, over thirty years ago, that
one cannot teach science without laboratories both for
the elementary and for the advanced instruction. He
actually beUeved that graduate schools in science needed
only a lot of blackboards, chalk, and sponges, and a lec-
turer who could prepare his lectures by reading books.
He beUeved what he thought would suit him best, namely,
that a university should be built on the top of a heap of
chalk, sponges, and books. These instrumentalities are
cheaper than laboratories, and that appeals to many
university trustees. The teacher who can lecture from
books and not from his experience in the laboratory is
also much cheaper. But heaven help the country which
trusts its destiny to cheap men operating with cheap
instrumentalities. I gave that trustee a lecture by re-
citing the sermon which Tyndall preached in the '^Sum-
mary and Conclusions" of his famous lectures of 1872-1873.
I was bold enough to deliver several of these lectures to
men in high places. Some liked them and some did not,
but they all agreed that I had my own opinions upon the
subject and was not afraid to express them.

The American Institute of Electrical Engineers had
heard of my somewhat novel opinions regarding the teach-
ing of the electrical science in its bearing upon electrical
engineering, and it invited me to give an address upon
the subject at its annual meeting in Boston, in the summer
of 1890. The address was entitled '^Practical Aspects
of the Alternating Current Theory." It was a eulogy

284 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

of the electrical science, and particularly of Faraday,
Maxwell, and Joseph Henry on the purely scientific side,
and of the technical men who were developing the system
of electrical power distribution by alternating electrical
forces. I noticed that my audience was divided into two
distinct groups; one group was cordial and appreciative,
but the other was as cold as ice. The famous electrical
engineer and inventor, Elihu Thomson, was in the friendly
group, and he looked me up after the address and con-
gratulated me cordially. That was a great encourage-
ment and I felt happy. Another man, a well-known physi-
cist and engineer, also looked me up, and asked me
whether I really expected that students of electrical en-
gineering could ever be trusted to swallow and digest all
the mathematical stuff which I had presented in my ad-
dress. The ^'mathematical stuff" to which he referred
was a very elementary theoretical illustration. I thought
of my chums, the tripos youngsters at Cambridge, and of
their wonderful capacity for swallowing and digesting
''mathematical stuff," but said nothing; the man who
was addressing me was one of those people who had a
small opinion of the capacity and willingness of our Amer-
ican boys to "swallow and digest" just as much "mathe-
matical stuff" as their EngUsh cousins do,

A short time prior to my return to Columbia College,
in 1889, a bitter polemic had been carried on in the New
York newspapers concerning the two methods of elec-
trical power distribution, the direct and the alternating cur-
rent method. The New York interests favored the first,
and another group, including the Westinghouse Com-
pany, supported the alternating current method. The
opponents of the latter method called it the "deadly al-
ternating current," and did their best to discredit it.
They actually succeeded, I was told, in persuading the
State authorities to install an alternating current machine
at the Sing Sing prison, to be used in electrocution.

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 285

When in my address at Boston I recited my eulogy of the
alternating current system I did not know of this bitter
polemic, but when I heard of it I understood the chilliness
among a part of my audience.

In the following autumn I was made to understand
that my address in Boston had made a bad impression,
and that it had offended the feelings of some hig men
who were interested in the electrical industries. I could
not help seeing the glaring hint that the new '^Depart-
ment of Electrical Engineering at Columbia College"
was to suffer from the fact that one of its two instructors
was accused of an unpardonable '^ electrical heresy." The
great and mighty person who broached this matter to me
suggested that perhaps the easiest way out of this diffi-
culty was my resignation. ''Very well," said I, "I will
certainly resign if the trustees of Columbia College, who
appointed me, find me guilty of a scientific heresy." The
trustees never heard of this incident, but my colleague
Crocker did, and he said in his characteristic manner:
"There are many persons to-day who would not hesitate
to burn the witch of Salem, but no persons of that kind
are on the board of trustees of Columbia College."
Crocker was a Cape Cod man and he had a very soft
spot for the witch of Salem.

The notion among many captains of industry that the
electrical science was in its infancy, and that it worked
by the rule of thumb, made it possible to launch an op-
position of that kind against the introduction of the al-
ternating current system of electrical distribution of
power. Tesla's alternating current motor and Bradley's
rotary transformer for changing alternating currents into
direct were available at that time. The electrical art
was ready then to do many of the things which it is
doing to-day so well, if it had not been for the opposition
of people who were afraid that they would have to scrap
some of their direct current apparatus and the plants for

286 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

manufacturing it, if the alternating current system re-
ceived any support. A most un-American mental at-
titude ! It was clear to every impartial and intelligent ex-
pert that the two systems supplemented each other in a
most admirable manner, and that the advancement of one
would also advance the other. Men like Elihu Thomson
and my colleague Crocker knew that, but ignorance and
false notions prevailed in the early nineties, because the
captains of electrical industries paid small attention to
highly trained electrical scientists. That explains why in
those days the barbarous steel cables were still employed
to drag cars along Third Avenue, New York, and why in
1893 I saw the preparatory work on Columbus Avenue,
New York, for installing additional barbarous steel ropes
to drag street-cars. But, fortunately, electrical traction
came to the rescue of Columbus Avenue.

During the summer of 1893 I had the good fortune to
meet, quite often, William Barclay Parsons, the distin-
guished engineer, the future builder of the first New York
subway, and to-day the distinguished chairman of the
Board of Trustees of Columbia University. He passed
the smnmer vacation at Atlantic Highlands, and I at
Monmouth Beach, and we used the same steamboat in
our occasional trips to New York. His head was full of
schemes for the solution of the New York rapid-transit
problem, but I observed that his ideas were not quite
clear on the question of the electrical power transmission
to be employed. A very few years later his ideas had
cleared wonderfully. He had visited Budapest in 1894
and had seen there surface cars operated electrically and
most satisfactorily by an underground trolley. It was a
most instructive object-lesson, but how humihating it
was to the engineering pride of the great United States to
consult Uttle Hungary in electrical engineering ! The
electrical power transmission system employed to-day in
the New York subways is practically the same which had

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 287

been proposed to and accepted by Parsons, the chief en-
gineer, not so many years after our trips to New York,
in 1893; it is the electrical power transmission consisting
of a combination of the alternating and direct current
systems. No fundamentally novel methods were em-
ployed which did not exist at the time when the alternat-
ing current machine was installed at Sing Sing for the
purpose of electrocuting people by the ^'deadly alternat-
ing current." In less than five years a radical change in
popular notions had taken place about a matter which
was well understood from the very first by men of higher
scientific training, like Stillwell, the chief engineer of the
Niagara Power Company, and Sprague, the well-known
pioneer in electrical traction, the inventor of the multiple
unit system, without which our subway would be practi-
cably impossible.

Four historical events, very important in the annals
of the electrical science in the United States, had hap-
pened in rapid succession between 1890 and 1894. The
first was the successful electrical transmission of power
between Lauffen and Frankfurt, in Germany, in 1891;
it employed the alternating current system. The second
was the decision of the Niagara Falls Power and Con-
struction Company to employ the alternating current sys-
tem for the transmission of its electrical power; Professor
Henry Augustus Rowland, of Johns Hopkins University,
as consulting expert of the company, favored this sys-
tem; another consulting scientific expert, the famous Lord
Kelvin, favored the direct current system. The third his-
torical event was the consohdation of the Edison General
Electric Company with the Thomson-Houston Company
of Lynn, Massachusetts. This consolidation meant the
end of the opposition to the alternating current system
on the part of people who were most influential in the
electrical industries. No such opposition could exist in
an electrical corporation where Elihu Thomson's expert

288 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

opinion had any weight. The fourth historical event
was the Electrical Congress at the World Exposition in
Chicago, in 1893. Helmholtz came over as an official del-
egate of the German Empire, and was elected honorary-
president of the congress. The subjects discussed at that
congress, and the men who discussed them, showed that
the electrical science was not in its infancy, and that elec-
trical things were not done by the rule of thumb.

Once I asked Professor Rowland whether anybody had
ever suggested to him resigning from Johns Hopkins
University on the ground that in favoring the alternating
current system for the Niagara Falls Power Transmis-
sion plant he had made himself liable to a charge of
heresy. ^'Heresy?" said he; ^'I thought that my heresy
was worth a big fee, and when the company attempted
to cut it down the courts sustained my claim." An in-
teresting bit of history is attached to this. When the
Niagara Power and Construction Company objected to
the size of the fee which Rowland charged for his services
as scientific adviser, and asked for a reduction, the matter
was referred to the court. During Rowland's cross-ex-
amination the defendant's lawyer, the late Joseph Choate,
asked him the question: ^'WTio, in your opinion, is the
greatest physicist in the United States?" Rowland an-
swered without a moment's hesitation: ^'I am." The
judge smiled, but agreed with the witness, and his agree-
ment was in harmony with the opinion of all scientific
men. Rowland justified his apparently egotistical an-
swer by the fact that as a witness on the stand he was
under oath to speak the truth; he certainly spoke the
truth when he testified that he was the leading physicist in
the United States.

Rowland's interest in the electrical science and its
technical applications helped much to dissipate the no-
tion, entertained by many, that it was empirical and still
in its infancy. Bogus inventors always encouraged this

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 289

superstition. The attention which Rowland and his
former pupil, the late Doctor Louis Duncan, devoted to
electrical engineering at Johns Hopkins University helped
much to raise the status of electrical engineering. Wlien
the new General Electric Company was organized by the
consolidation of the Edison General Electric Company
and the Thomson-Houston Company, Elihu Thomson
became the chief scientific adviser of the new corporation,
and its highest court of appeals in scientific matters. I
remember telling my colleague, Crocker, that if the Thom-
son-Houston Company had contributed nothing else than
Elihu Thomson to the new corporation it would have
contributed more than enough. Thomson, in my opinion,
was the American Siemens, and Rowland was the Ameri-
can Helmholtz, of the new era in the history of American
industries — the era of close co-operation between abstract
science and engineering. With these two men among the
leaders of the electrical science and the electrical industry
in the United States, the senseless opposition to the alter-
nating current system of power distribution began to
wane. It vanished quickly after the Electrical Congress
of 1893. The first visible result of the co-operation be-
tween abstract science and the technical arts was the
splendid power plant at Niagara Falls, and later the elec-
trical power distribution system in the New York sub-
ways, in which the alternating and the direct current sys-
tems supplemented each other most admirably.

The scientific spirit of Rowland's laboratory and lec-
ture-room was felt everywhere in the electrical industries;
it was felt also in our educational institutions. His and
his students' researches in solar spectra and in other prob-
lems of higher physics made that spirit the dominating
influence among the rising generation of physical science
in America. It was universally acknowledged that Johns
Hopkins was a real university. The intellectual move-
ment in favor of higher scientific research, first inaugurated

290 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

by Joseph Henry, President Barnard of Columbia College,
and Doctor John William Draper, in the early seventies,
was marching on steadily under the leadership of Rowland
when I started my academic career at Columbia, thirty-
four years ago, and he led on like a ''doughty knight of
Troy," as Maxwell used to call him. It was the spirit of
Johns Hopkins which inspired the generation of the early
nineties in its encouragement of the movement for the
development of the American university. Some enthu-
siasts at Columbia College went even so far as to advocate
the abohtion of the college curriculum and the substi-
tution of a Columbia University for Columbia College;
I was not among these enthusiasts, because I knew only
too well the historical value of Columbia College and of
other American colleges. What would the University of
Cambridge be without its ancient colleges ? College lays
the foundation for higher citizenship; the university lays
the foundation for higher learning.

Speaking for physical sciences I can say that in those
days there was no lack of trained scientists who could
easily have extended the work of the American college,
and added to it a field of advanced work resembhng closely
the activity of the European universities. Most of these
men had received their higher academic training in Eu-
ropean universities, and quite a number of them came
from Johns Hopkins. But there were two obstacles:
first, lack of experimental-research facilities; second, lack
of leisure for scientific research. Rowland and his fol-
lowers recognized the existence of these obstacles, and
demanded reform. Most of the energy of the teachers
of physical sciences was consumed in the lecture-room;
they were pedagogues, ''pouring information into pas-
sive recipients," as Barnard described it. My own case
was a typical one. How could I do any research as long
as I had at my disposal a dynamo, a motor, an alternator,
and a few crude measuring instruments only, all intended

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 291

to be used every day for the instruction of electrical-
engineering students? When the professor of engineer-
ing died, in the summer of 1891, a part of his work, theory
of heat and hydraulics, was assigned to me. The pro-
fessor of dynamics died a little later, and his work also
was transferred to me. I was to carry the additional
load of lecture-room work temporarily, but was relieved
from it, in part only, after several years. As a reward
my title was advanced to adjunct professor, with an ad-
vance of salary to two thousand five hundred dollars
per annum. But in return for this royal salary I had to
lecture three to four hours each forenoon, and help in
the electrical laboratory instruction in the afternoons.
While this pedagogic load was on my back scientific
research could not be seriously thought of. My young
colleagues in other colleges were similarly situated. This
overloading of young scientists with pedagogic work
threatened to stunt, and often did stunt, their growth
and also the growth of the rising American university.
'^Let chairs be founded, sufficiently but not luxuriously
endowed, which shall have original research for their
main object and ambition, '^ was the historic warning
which Tyndall addressed to the American people in 1873,
but in 1893 there was httle evidence that it was heeded
anywhere outside of Johns Hopkins University. But
there they had Rowland and a number of other stars of
the first magnitude who had succeeded Joseph Henry,
Barnard, and Draper as leaders of the great movement in
favor of higher scientific research. In 1883 Rowland de-
livered a memorable address as vice-president of one of
the sections of the American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science. It was entitled, '^A Plea for Pure
Science," and described the spirit not only of Johns Hop-
kins of those days but also of all friends of higher learning
in science. That spirit was advocated here by Tyndall in
1872-1873, and under Rowland's leadershin it was bound

292 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

to win our battle for higher ideals in science. The people
of the United States owe a great debt of gratitude to
Johns Hopkins for the leadership in that great move-
ment which, as we see to-day, has produced a most re-
markable intellectual advancement in this country.
Nearly thirty years ago I heard Rowland say in a public
address: ^'They always say in Baltimore that no man
in that city should die without leaving something to Johns
Hopkins." When he said it he knew that Johns Hopkins
was very poor. It is poorer to-day than ever, and no
rich man in the United States should die without leaving
something to Johns Hopkins, the pioneer university of
the United States.

Rowland said once that lack of experimental facilities
and of time was not a valid excuse for neglecting entirely
scientific research. I agreed with that opinion; neglect
breeds indifference, and indifference degenerates into
atrophy of the spirit of inquiry. The alternating current
machine of the electrical engineering laboratory at Co-
lumbia was free in the evenings, and so was my time;
that is, if my wife should not object, and, being a noble
and unselfish woman, she did not object. With the as-
sistance of several enthusiastic students, among them
Gano Dunn, to-day one of the most distinguished en-
gineers in the United States, I started investigating the
passage of electricity through various gases at low pres-
sures, and published two papers in the American Journal
of Science. I soon discovered that most of my results
had been anticipated by Professor J. J. Thomson, of Cam-
bridge, who, in all probability, had received his inspira-
tion from the same source from which I had received mine.
He not only had anticipated me but, moreover, he showed
a much better grasp of the subject than I had, and had
much better experimental facilities. I decided to leave
the field to him, and to watch his beautiful work from the
outside. It was a wise decision, because it prepared me

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 293

to understand the epoch-making discoveries in this field
which were soon to be announced, one in Germany and
one in France. I turned my attention to another field.

I must mention, however, one of the results which
Thomson had not anticipated and which created quite
an impression among astronomers. I noticed a peculiar
appearance in the electrical discharge proceeding from a
Fmall metal sphere which was located in the centre of a
large glass sphere containing air at low pressure. The
discharges looked very much like the luminous corona of
the sun which astronomers observe during eclipses, and
which was always a mysterious puzzle in solar physics.
Pasting a tin-foil disk on the glass sphere, so as to hide the
metal sphere and see only the discharge proceeding from
it, I photographed the appearance of the discharge and
obtained the pictures given opposite page 294. The re-
semblance of these photographs to those of the two types
of the solar corona is most striking. This is what I said
about it at that time:

^^The bearing which these experimental results may
have upon the theory of the solar corona I prefer to leave
to others to decide. That they may prove a suggestive
guide in the study of solar phenomena seems not un-
reasonable to expect."

In a communication read later before the New York
Academy of Sciences I was much bolder, having previ-
ously discussed the subject with my friends at Johns
Hopkins and with the late Professor Young, the famous
astronomer at Princeton. I soon found myself advocat-
ing strongly the electromagnetic theory of solar phe-
nomena. A German professor, Ebert by name, a well-
known authority on electrical discharges in gases, took
me very seriously indeed, which was very flattering, but
he claimed priority. I had no difficulty in estabhshing
my priority through the columns of Astronomij and Astro-
physics, one of whose editors was George Ellery Hale>

294 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

to-day the distinguished director of Mount Wilson Ob-
servatory. I was indeed fortunate to make his acquaint-
ance during that period when both he and I were very
young men. His influence prevented me from running
wild with my electromagnetic theory of solar phenomena.
Thanks to the splendid astro-physical researches at the
Mount Wilson Observatory in Cahfornia under Doctor
Hale's direction, we know to-day that enormous electri-
cal currents circulate on the surface of the sun, and we
know also from other researches that negative electricity
is shot out from all hot bodies, even from those not nearly
as hot as the sun, and that the solar corona is, in all
probability, closely related to this electrical activity on
the sun.

After giving up the subject of electrical discharges in
gases I looked around for another problem of research
which I could manage with my meagre laboratory faciU-
ties. Rowland had found distortions in an alternating
current when that current was magnetizing iron in elec-
trical power apparatus. This distortion consisted of the
addition of higher harmonics to the normal harmonic
changes in the current. This reminded me of harmonics
in musical instruments and in the human voice. Helm-
holtz was the first to analyze the vowels in human speech
by studying the harmonics which they contained. The
vowel 0, for instance, sung at a given pitch, contains in
addition to its fundamental pitch — say one hundred
vibrations per second — other vibrations the frequencies
of which are integral multiples of one hundred, that is
two, three, four, . . . hundred vibrations per second.
These higher vibrations are called harmonics of the funda-
mental. Helmholtz detected these harmonics by the
employment of acoustical resonators; it was an epoch-
making research. I proceeded to search for a similar
procedure for the analysis of Rowland's distorted alternat-
ing currents, and I found it. I constructed electrical

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 295

resonators based upon dynamical principles similar to
those in the acoustical resonators employed by Helm-
holtz. These electrical resonators play a most important
part in the radio art of to-day, and a few words regard-
ing their operation seem desirable. In fact, there is to-
day a cry from the Atlantic to the Pacific on the part of
millions of people who wish to know what they are really
doing when they are turning a knob on their radio-receiv-
ing sets in order to find the correct wave length for a
certain broadcasting station. I am responsible for the
operation, and I owe them an explanation of it.

The mass and form of an elastic body, say a tuning-
fork, and its stiffness determine the pitch, the so-called
frequency of vibration. When a periodically varying
force, say a wave of sound, acts upon the tuning-fork,
the maximum motion of the prongs will be produced
when the pitch or frequency of the moving force is equal
to the frequency of the tuning-fork. The two are said
then to be in resonance, that is, the motion of the fork
resonates to or synchronizes with the action of the force.
Every elastic structure has a frequency of its own. The
column of air in an organ-pipe has a frequency of its own;
so has the string of a piano. One can excite the motion
of each by singing a note of the same frequency; a note
of a considerably different frequency excites practically
no motion at all. Acoustical resonance phenomena are
too well known to need here any further comment. There
are also electrical resonance phenomena very similar to
those of acoustical resonance. If you understand one of
them there is no difficulty in understanding the other.

If an electrical conductor, say a copper wire, is coiled
up so as to form a coil of many turns, and its terminals
are connected to a condenser, that is to conducting plates
which are separated from each other by insulating ma-
terial, then the motion of electricity in that conducting
circuit is subject to the same laws as the motion of the

296 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

prongs of a tuning-fork. Every motion, whether of elec-
tricity or of matter, is determined completely by the
force which produces the motion, and by the forces with
which the moving object reacts against the motion. If
the law of action of these several forces is the same in the
case of moving matter as in the case of moving electricity,
then their motions also will be the same. The moving
forces are called the action and the opposing forces are
called the reaction, and Newton's third law of motion
says: Action is equal to the opposing reaction. 1 always
considered this the most fundamental law in all physical
sciences. It is applicable to all motions no matter what
the thing is which moves, whether ponderable matter or
imponderable electricity. Twenty-six years ago a stu-
dent of mine, Albert R. Gallatin, brother of the present
park commissioner of New York, presented a large in-
duction coil to the electrical laboratory at Columbia Col-
lege in recognition of my services to him, because, he
said, this formulation of the fundamental law in the elec-
trical science, which I have just given, made everything
very clear to him. This was most encouraging to a young
professor, and it goes without saying that ever since that
time he and I have been warm friends. He is a banker
and I am still a professor, but the interest in the funda-
mental principles in physical sciences are a strong bond
of union between us.

The electrical force which moves the electricity in the
circuit, just described, experiences two principal reac-
tions. One reaction is due to the lines of electrical force
which, attached to the electrical charge on the condenser
plates, are crowded into the insulating space between
these plates. This reaction corresponds to the elastic
reaction of the prongs of the tuning-fork, and follows the
same law. In the case of the tuning-fork the elastic reac-
tion is proportional to the displacement of the prongs from
their normal position; in the electrical case the reacting

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 297

force is proportional to the electrical charges which have
been pulled apart, the negative from the positive, and
driven to the plates of the condenser. Call this separa-
tion electrical displacement, and the law can be given the
same form as above, namely : The reacting force is propor-
tional to the electrical displacement. The greater the dis-
tance between the plates, and the smaller their surface,
the greater is the reaction for a given electrical displace-
ment. By varying these two quantities we can vary the
electrical yielding, the so-called capacity, of the electrical
condenser. This is what you do when you turn the knob
and vary the capacity of the condenser in your receiving
set.

The moving prongs have a momentum, and a change
in the momentum opposes a reacting force, the so-called
inertia reaction, which is equal to the rate of this change.
This was discovered by Galileo over three hundred years
ago. We experience the operation of this law every time
we bump against a moving object. The Irish sailor who,
after describing the accident which made him fall from
the mast, assured his friends that it was not the fall
which hurt him but the sudden stop, appreciated fully
the reacting force due to a rapid change of momentum.
Every boy and girl in the public schools should know
Galileo's fundamental law, and they would know it if
by a few simple experiments it were taught to them. But
how many teachers really teach it? How many of my
readers really know that law? Just think of it, what an
impeachment it is of our modern system of education to
have so many intelligent men and women, boys and girls,
ignorant of so fundamental a law as that which Galileo
discovered so long ago !

The moving electricity has a momentum. The mag-
netic lines of force produced by this motion are a measure
of this momentum. Their change is opposed by a react-
ing force equal to the rate of this change. This was dis-

298 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

covered by Faraday nearly a hundred years ago. The
larger the number of turns in the coil of wire the larger
will be the momentum for a given electrical motion, that
is, for a given electrical current. But how can anybody
understand very clearly this beautiful law, discovered by
Faraday, who does not understand Galileo's simpler dis-
covery? The fact that electricity, just like matter, has
inertia, and that both obey the same law of inertia, is one
of the most beautiful discoveries in science. Whenever I
thought that so many intelligent and cultured people
knew nothing about it I rebelled against the educational
system of modern civilization.

The motion of electricity in the conductor described
above overcomes reacting forces which follow the same
laws as the motion of the elastic prongs of the tuning-
fork. The motion of one has, therefore, an analogy in
the motion of the other. In an electrical circuit having
a coil and a condenser the moving electricity has a definite
inertia and a definite electrical stiffness; hence it will
have a definite pitch or frequency for its vibratory
motion, just like a tuning-fork; it will act as a resona-
tor. It is obvious, therefore, that an electrical resonator,
the pitch of which can be adjusted by adjusting its
coil or its condenser or both, is a perfect parallel to the
acoustical resonator. By means of an electrical resonator
of this kind, having an adjustable coil and an adjust-
able condenser, I succeeded in detecting every one of
the harmonics in Rowland's distorted alternating cur-
rents, in the same manner in which Helmholtz detected
the harmonics in the vowel sounds, but with much greater
ease, because the pitch of an electrical resonator can be
very easily and accurately changed by adjusting its coil
and condenser. There are millions of people to-day who
are doing that very thing when they are turning the knobs
on their radio receiving sets, adjusting them to the wave-
length of the transmitting station. The expression, ^'ad-

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 299

justing them to the pitch or frequency of the transmitting
station," is much better, because it reminds the operator
of the analogy existing between acoustical and electrical
resonance. The procedure was inaugurated thirty years
ago in the '^cowshed" of old Columbia College. I called
it ^^ electrical tuning" and the name has stuck to it down
to the present time. The word ^'tuning" was suggested
by the operation which the Serbian bagpiper performs
when he tunes up his bagpipes, which I watched with a
lively interest in my boyhood days. Those early impres-
sions had made acoustical and electrical resonance appear
to me later as obvious things.

The results of this research were published in the Amer-
ican Journal of Science and also in the Transactions of the
American Institute of Electrical Engineers for 1894. They,
I was told, had never been anticipated ; and they confirmed
fully Rowland's views concerning the magnetic reaction
of iron when subjected to the magnetic action of an al-
ternating current. When Helmholtz visited this country
in 1893, I showed him my electrical resonators and the
research which I was conducting with their assistance.
He was quite impressed by the striking similarity between
his acoustical resonance analysis and my electrical reso-
nance analysis, and urged me to push on the work and
repeat his early experiments in acoustical resonance,
because my electrical method was much more convenient
than his acoustical method.

Helmholtz was always interested in the analysis as
well as in the synthesis of vibrations corresponding to
articulate speech. The telephone and the phonograph
were two inventions which always enjoyed his admiring
attention. During his visit in America he looked forward
with much pleasure to meeting Graham Bell and Edison.
The simphcity of their inventions astonished him, because
one would hardly have expected that a simple disk could
vibrate so as to reproduce faithfully all the complex vibra-

300 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

tions which are necessary for articulation. He spent a
Sunday afternoon as my guest at Monmouth Beach and
in the course of conversation I told him what impression
the telephone had made upon me when I first listened
through it. It happened during the period when I was
serving my apprenticeship as greenhorn, and when I
was trying hard to master the articulation of the Eng-
lish language. The telephone plate repeated perfectly
everything spoken at the other end, and I said to my-
self: ^^ These Americans are too clever for me; they can
make a plain steel plate articulate much better than I
can ever expect to do it with all my speaking organs. I
had better return to Idvor and become a herdsman again."
Helmholtz laughed heartily and assured me that the artic-
ulating telephone plate had made a similar impression
upon him, although he had spent several years of his life
studying the theory of articulation. ^'The phonograph
disk is just as clever as the telephone disk," said Helm-
holtz, '^ perhaps even more so, because it has to dig hard
while it is busily talking."

My scientific friends in New York saw in the construc-
tion of my electrical resonator and in its employment for
selective detection of alternating currents of definite
frequency a very suitable means for practising har-
monic telegraphy, first suggested by Graham Bell, the
inventor of the telephone. They finally persuaded me to
apply for a patent and I did so. I often regretted it, be-
cause it involved me in a most expensive and otherwise
annoying legal contest. Two other inventors had applied
for a patent on the same invention. One of them was an
American, and the other a French inventor, and each of
them was backed by a powerful industrial corporation.
A college professor with a salary of two thousand five
hundred dollars per annum cannot stand a long legal
contest when opposed by two powerful corporations; but
it is a curious psychological fact that when one's claim

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 301

to an invention is disputed he will fight for it just as a
tigress would fight for her cub. The fight lasted nearly
eight years and I won it. I was declared to be the in-
ventor, and the patent was granted to me. But a patent
is a piece of paper worth nothing until somebody needs
the invention. I waited a long time before that some-
body came, and when he finally showed up I had almost
forgotten that I had made the invention. In the mean-
time I had nothing but a piece of paper for all my pains,
which nearly wrecked me financially.

Just about that time the newspapers reported that a
young Itahan student by the name of Marconi, while
experimenting with Hertzian waves, had demonstrated
that a Hertzian oscillator will send out electrical waves
w^hich will penetrate much longer distances when one of
its sides is connected to earth. ''Of course it will," said
I, ''the grounded oscillator takes the earth into closer
partnership." When as a herdsman's assistant on the
pasturelands of my native Idvor I stuck my knife into
the ground and struck its wooden handle, I knew per-
fectly well that the ground was a part of the vibrating
system, and that the sound-producing stroke was taken
up by the ground much better than when I struck the
knife-handle without sticking the knife into the ground.
But I also knew that unless the boy who was listening
pressed his ear against the ground he would not hear
very much. It was, therefore, quite obvious to me that
the best detector for a Hertzian oscillator which is
grounded must be another Hertzian oscillator which is
also connected to the ground. Grounding of the sending
and of the receiving Hertzian oscillators was in fact the
fundamental claim of the Marconi invention. Marconi,
in my opinion, was unwittingly imitating the young herds-
men of Idvor when, figuratively speaking, he stuck his
electrical knives into the ground for the purpose of trans-
mitting and receiving electrical vibrations, but the imi-

302 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

tation was a very clever one; very obvious indeed as soon
as it was pointed out, like all clever things.

Every now and then we are told that wireless signals
might be sent some day to the planet Mars. The judg-
ment of a former herdsman of Idvor considers these sug-
gestions unscientific for the simple reason that we cannot
get a ground on the planet Mars and, therefore, cannot
take it into close partnership with our Hertzian oscil-
lators. Without that partnership there is no prospect
of covering great distances. A very simple experiment
will illustrate this. Scratch the wood of a pencil and ask
your friends who are sitting around a table whether they
hear the scratching. They will say ''No.' ^ Put the pencil
on the table and scratch it again; your friends will tell
you that they can hear it faintly. Ask them to press
their ears against the table and they will tell you that
the scratching sound is very loud. In the third case the
pencil, the table, and the ears of your friends are all one
closely interconnected vibratory system. Every herds-
man of Idvor would interpret correctly the physical mean-
ing of this experiment. ''If Marconi had waited just a
little longer I should have done his trick myself,'' I said
jokingly to Crocker, and then I temporarily dismissed
the matter from my mind as if nothing had happened.
But I was fairly confident that my electrical resonators
would some day find a useful apphcation in this new
method of signalling, and Crocker was even more hope-
ful than I was. I turned my attention to another prob-
lem and would have completed its solution, if my work
had not been interrupted by the announcement of a most
remarkable discovery made in Germany, I mean the dis-
covery of the Roentgen rays.

I cannot describe the effects of this epoch-making dis-
covery without referring again to great Helmholtz. It
was due to his initiative that Hertz took up the research
of electrical oscillations, which suggested to Marconi

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 303

their technical application. This started a new tech-
nical art, wireless telegraphy, which developed into the
radio art. Without Helmholtz, not only the experimental
verification of the Faraday-Maxwell electromagnetic
theory but also the radio art might have been delayed
quite a long time. I shall point out now that the great
discovery of the Roentgen rays also was due in a great
measure to the initiative of Helmholtz.

While in Berlin I was conducting a research upon vapor
pressures of salt solutions. For this purpose I needed the
assistance of a clever glass-blower. A Herr Mueller was
recommended to me by the people of the Physical In-
stitute. I paid frequent visits to him, not only because
I liked to watch his wonderful skill in glass-blowing, but
also because he knew and entertained me often with the
history of a remarkable physical research which had been
carried out by Doctor Goldstein, a Berlin physicist, under
the auspices of the German Academy of Sciences, Herr
Mueller, the glass-blowing artist, assisting.

The motion of electricity through rarefied gases was
first extensively studied in Germany in the fifties and
sixties by several investigators. Hittorf was one of them,
and I mention him here for reasons given later. The
English physicists took up the subject a little later, and
among them Crookes did the most distinguished work.
His tubes with a very high vacuum gave brilliant cathode
rays, first discovered by Hittorf, which produced among
other things the well-known phosphorescence in vacuum
tubes made of uranium glass. In spite of the surpassing
beauty of the electrical phenomena in vacuum tubes
revealed by Crookes's experiments, no final and definite
conclusions could be drawn from them toward the end
of the seventies. But he was undoubtedly the first who
correctly inferred that the cathode rays were small elec-
trified particles moving with very high velocity. This in-
ference proved to be of very great importance. In 1893

304 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Lord Kelvin said: '^If the first step toward understanding
the relations between ether and ponderable matter is to be
made, it seems to me that the most hopeful foundation
for it is knowledge derived from experiment on electricity
in high vacuum." This was the very opinion which Helm-
holtz had formulated fifteen years earlier, and he per-
suaded the German Academy of Sciences to make a spe-
cial grant for a thorough experimental review of the whole
field of research relating to electrical motions in high
vacua. Doctor Goldstein was selected to carry out this
work. Mueller was his glass-blower. The most impor-
tant result of this work was the discovery of the so-called
Canal Rays, that is, motion of positive electricity in the
direction opposite to the motion of negative electricity,
the latter being the cause of the cathode rays. To get
that result Mueller had to make innumerable vacuum
tubes of all sorts of shapes. He told me that if all these
tubes could be resurrected they would fill the house in
which his shop was located. ''But the grand result was
worth all the trouble, and I am proud that I did all the
glass-blowing," said Mueller, with a triumphant light in
his eyes, and his beaming countenance testified that he
felt what he said. He was an artisan who loved his craft ;
and, judging from his remarkable knowledge of all the
vacuum-tube researches which had been conducted up to
the time of his co-operation with Doctor Goldstein, I in-
ferred that he was a unique combination of the science
and the art involved in the job which he was doing for
Doctor Goldstein. Mueller was the first to arouse my
interest in the results of vacuum-tube researches, and I
always considered him one of my distinguished teachers
in Berlin. New knowledge is not confined to the lecture-
rooms of a great university; it can often be found in most
humble shops, treasured by humble people who are cjuite
unconscious that they are the guardians of a precious
treasure. Mueller was one of these humble guardians.

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 305

The importance of Goldstein's work was due principally
to the fact that it brought into the field three other Ger-
man physicists of great acumen. The first one was Hertz.
Several years after he had completed his splendid experi-
mental verification of the Faraday-Maxwell electro-
magnetic theory, he showed that the cathode rays pene-
trated easily through thin films of metal, like gold and
aluminum foil, although these films were perfectly opaque
to ordinary light. It was a novel and most important
contribution to our knowledge of cathode rays, and would
have been followed up by more additional knowledge if
Hertz had not died on January 1, 1894, at the age of thirty-
six. Helmholtz died several months later. Science never
suffered a greater loss in so short an interval of time.
Helmholtz met with an accident on the ship on his return
trip from the United States in 1893. He never completely
recovered, although he lectured at the University of Ber-
lin until a few days before his sudden death in the mid-
summer of 1894. Autopsy revealed that one side of his
brain was and had been in a pathological state for a long
time, but nobody had ever observed that his intellectual
power had shown any signs of decay. It is a pity that he
did not live another two years; he would have seen what
he told me during his visit here he longed to see, and that
is an electrified body moving at a very high velocity sud-
denly reversing its motion. That, he thought, might
furnish a direct experimental test of the mobility of ether.
The discovery described below furnished such a body.

Hertz's work was continued and greatly extended by
Professor Lenard of the University of Kiel. He would
have undoubtedly reached the final goal if Roentgen had
not announced, in December, 1895, that he, experiment-
ing with Lenard vacuum tubes, had discovered the X-rays.
This discovery marked the last step in the survey which
Goldstein, under the initiative of Helmholtz, had under-
taken some fifteen years before Roentgen had entered

306 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the field of electrical discharges in high vacua. It was a
great triumph for German science. The science of elec-
trical discharges in rarefied gases was started in Germany
and in less than forty years it had reached there its highest
point. It is a science which may justly be said to have
been '^made in Germany," just as the science of radiation.
It started a new and most remarkable era in physical
sciences by extending the meaning of the Faraday-Max-
well electromagnetic theory.

No other discovery within my lifetime had ever aroused
the interest of the world as did the discovery of the X-rays.
Every physicist dropped his own research problems and
rushed headlong into the research of the X-rays. The
physicists of the United States had paid only small at-
tention to vacuum-tube discharges. To the best of my
knowledge and belief I was at that time the only physicist
here who had had any laboratory experience with vacuum-
tube research, and I got it by overtime work in the elec-
trical-engineering laboratory of Columbia College. I
undertook it because my intercourse with Mueller, the
glass-blower of BerUn, directed my attention to this
field of research, and particularly because I did not see
that with the equipment of that laboratory I could do
anything else. I decided, as mentioned above, to leave
the field to Professor J. J. Thomson, of Cambridge, and
to watch his work. When, therefore. Roentgen's dis-
covery was first announced I was, it seems, better pre-
pared than anybody else in this country to repeat his
experiments and succeeded, therefore, sooner than any-
body else on this side of the Atlantic. I obtained the
first X-ray photograph in America on January 2, 1896,
two weeks after the discovery was announced in Ger-
many.

Many interesting stories have been told about the
rush to the West during the gold-fever period, caused
by the discovery of gold in the far West. The rush into

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 307

X-ray experimentation was very similar, and I also caught
the fever badly. Newspaper reporters and physicians
heard of it, and I had to lock myself up in my laboratory,
which was in the cellar of President Low's official resi-
dence at Columbia College, in order to protect myself
from continuous interruptions. The physicians brought
all kinds of cripples for the purpose of having their bones
photographed or examined by means of the fluorescent
screen. The famous surgeon, the late Doctor Bull of
New York, sent me a patient with nearly a hundred small
shot in his left hand. His name was Prescott Hall
Butler, a well-known lawyer of New York, who had met
with an accident and received in his hand the full charge
of a shotgun. He was in agony; he and I had mutual
friends who begged me to make an X-ray photograph
of his hand and thus enable Doctor Bull to locate the
numerous shot and extract them. The first attempts
were unsuccessful, because the patient was too weak and
too nervous to stand a photographic exposure of nearly
an hour. My good friend, Thomas Edison, had sent me
several most excellent fluorescent screens, and by their
fluorescence I could see the numerous Httle shot and so
could my patient. The combination of the screen and
the eyes was evidently much more sensitive than the
photographic plate. I decided to try a combination of
Edison's fluorescent screen and the photographic plate.
The fluorescent screen was placed on the photographic
plate and the patient's hand was placed upon the screen.
The X-rays acted upon the screen first and the screen by
its fluorescent hght acted upon the plate. The combina-
tion succeeded, even better than I had expected. A
beautiful photograph was obtained with an exposure of a
few seconds. The photographic plate showed the nu-
merous shot as if they had been drawn with pen and ink.
Doctor Bull operated and extracted every one of them
in the course of a short and easy surgical operatiuji.

308 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Prescott Hall Butler was well again. That was the first
X-ray picture obtained by that process during the first
part of February, 1896, and it was also the first surgical
operation performed in America under the guidance of
an X-ray picture. This process of shortening the time
of exposure is now universally used, but nobody gives
me any credit for the discovery, although I described it
in the journal Electricity , of February 12, 1896, before
anybody else had even thought of it. Prescott Hall
Butler was much more appreciative and he actually pro-
posed, when other offers to reward me for my efforts were
refused, to estabhsh a fellowship for me at the Century
Club, the fellowship to entitle me to two toddies daily
for the rest of my life. This offer also was refused.

On March 2, 1896, the late Professor Arthur Gordon
Webster, of Clark University, Worcester, Massachusetts,
adressed a letter to the Worcester Gazette, from which I
quote :

Sunday morning I went with Professor Pupin to his laboratory to
try the effect of a fluorescent screen in front of the plate. I placed
my hand under the bulb and in five minutes the current was stopped.
. . . The result was the best plate that I had yet seen. . . . One
who has tried the experiments and seen how long it takes to obtain a
good result can judge of an improvement. I think that Doctor Pupin
should enjoy the credit of having actually . . . shortened the time of
exposure ten and twenty times.

A description of the improvement, which I published in
final form in Electricity, of April 15, 1896, ends with the
following sentence:

My only object in working on the improvement of the Roentgen
ray photography was for the purpose of widening its scope of applica-
tion to surgical diagnosis. I think that I have succeeded completely
and I wish full credit for the work done.

My friends suggested that I apply for a patent on the
procedure and enforce recognition that way, but I was
having one expensive experience in the patent office with

MY ACADEMIC CAREER AT COLUMBIA 309

my electrical resonators and did not care to add an-
other.

The question of reflection and refraction of the X-rays
had to be answered, and several strange claims were
brought fon\^ard by investigators. My investigations of
this matter, aided by Thomas Edison's most efficient
fluorescent screen, resulted in a discovery, which, in a
communication to the New York Academy of Sciences,
on April 6, 1S96, I summed up as follows: ^^ Every sub-
stance when subjected to the action of X-rays becomes a
radiator of these rays.^' The communication was published
in several scientific journals, like Science and Electricity,
and no statement can claim the discovery of the now well-
know^n secondary X-ray radiation more clearly than the
one given above. But of this matter I shall speak a little
later.

Looking up some data lately I found that I had finished
writing out these communications relating to my X-ray
research on April 14, 1896. I also found a reprint of an
address delivered before the New York Academy of
Sciences in April, 1895, and published in Science of Decem-
ber 28, 1895, at the very time when the X-ray fever broke
out. It w^as entitled: ^^ Tendencies of Modern Electrical
Research.'^ But the X-ray fever prevented me from
reading it when it was published. I saw it three months
later, but never again since that time, and I had forgotten
that I had ever composed it. I find now that the picture
which I had draw^n then of the growth of the electro-
magnetic theory is in every detail the same as that which
I have given in this narrative. Both of them are due to
the lasting impressions received in Cambridge and in
Berlin. Evidently these impressions are just as strong
to-day as they were twenty-eight years ago, proving that
the tablets of memory have a mysterious process of pre-
serving their records. I remember that on April 14, 1896,
I did not go to the laboratory, but stayed at home and

310 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

reflected, and read my address mentioned above. I took
an inventory of what I had done during my six years'
activity at Columbia and I closed the books satisfied with
the results. My wife, who had helped me, writing out
my reports, lectures, and scientific conamunications, and
who knew and watched every bit of the work which I
was doing, also was satisfied, and congratulated me. My
colleague Crocker, I knew, was satisfied, and so were all
my scientific friends, and that was a source of much sat-
isfaction. But nothing makes one as happy as his own
honest belief that he has done his best.

XI

THE RISE OF IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE

I MUST make a digression now, to arrange suitable con-
tacts between the preceding parts of my narrative and
its concluding chapters. The main object of my narra-
tive has been to describe the rise of ideahsm in American
science, and particularly in physical sciences and the
related industries. I witnessed this gradual develop-
ment; everything I have written so far is an attempt
to qualify as a witness whose testimony has competence
and weight. But there are many other American scien-
tists whose opinions in this matter have more compe-
tence and weight than my opinion has. Why, then,
should a scientist who started his career as a Serbian
immigrant speak of the idealism in American science,
when there are so many native-born American scien-
tists who know more about this subject than I do?
Those who have read my narrative so far may answer
this question. I shall only point out now that there are
certain psychological elements in this question which
justify me in the belief that occasionally an immigrant
can see things which escape the attention of the native.
Seeing is believing; let him speak who has the faith,
provided he has a message to dehver.

A foreign-born citizen of the United States has many
occasions to sing praises of the virtues of this country
which the native-born citizen has not. Such occasions
arise whenever the foreign-born citizen revisits his na-
tive land and hears opinions about America which are

based upon European prejudice born of ignorance. On

311

312 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

these occasions he can, if the spirit moves him, say many
things with much more grace than a native American
could. The spirit will move him if his naturalization
means that he knows America's traditions and embraces
their precepts with sincere enthusiasm. Statements
which, coming from a native American, might sound as
boasts and bragging, may and often do sound different
when they are made by a naturalized American citizen.
I have had quite a number of experiences of this kind;
one of them deserves mention here.

Four years ago, while visiting my native land, I was
invited to attend a festive public meeting in a town not
far from my native village. It was the town of Panchevo,
where in my boyhood days I went to school, and where
from my Slovenian teacher, Kos, I had heard for the first
time of Benjamin Franklin and of his kite. The earliest
parts of this narrative show that many memories of my
boyhood days had nourished in my heart an affectionate
regard for this historic town. Panchevo reciprocated,
and hence the invitation. There was another reason.
In March of 1919, the chairman of the Yugoslav dele-
gation at the Paris peace conference invited me to go to
Paris, expecting that with my knowledge of the English
language and of the Anglo-Saxon mentality I could proba-
bly assist the delegation in its work. I spent seven weeks
in Paris. The result, I was assured by Premier Pashitch
of Serbia, was very satisfactory; and he invited me to go
to Belgrade as guest of the government, for the purpose
of studying the condition of the war orphans in Serbia.
This study resulted in the organization of the Serbian
Child Welfare Association of America, whose splendid
work is known and appreciated in every part of the Ser-
bian nation. When Panchevo heard that I was in Bel-
grade it sent me the invitation.

The literary society of Panchevo, called the Academy,
had arranged a gala public session, and the occasion was

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 313

the ^^ Wilson Day," which the town was celebrating. The
orator of the day was a young Slovene, a learned lawyer
and man of letters. The subject of his oration was:
'^ President Wilson and his fourteen points." He wound
up his splendid eulogy of President Wilson by exclaiming :
'^ President Wilson is an oasis of idealism in the endless
desert of materialism.^' The image of my old friend Bil-
harz, the hermit of Cortlandt Street, suddenly appeared
before me, and his favorite phrase '^American material-
ism" rang violently in my ears. I was afraid that the
United States of America would be understood to be a
part of the endless desert mentioned by the speaker, and
the possibility of such an inference I did not like. A most
enthusiastic and long-continued applause greeted this
oratorical climax, and before the applause was over the
chairman, w^ho was the mayor of the town, approached
me and asked whether I should like to address a few words
to the great assembly of the intellectuals of the town.
^^I not only like to do it," said I, ^^but I insist upon it."
The chairman looked pleased, because he could not help
observing that the orator's concluding figure of speech
had stirred me up considerably, and that my response
to it might add a few lively notes to the rather monoto-
nous programme of the Academy session.

I repeat here some of the sentiments which I expressed
on that occasion:

President Wilson is an idealist, and his idealism commands my
deepest respect and admiration. I deny, however, that he represents
an "oasis of ideaUsm in an endless desert of materialism," that is, if
the United States of America are understood to be a part of this end-
less desert. I am sure that in this town, Hberated only a few months
ago from the Austrian yoke, the expression "materialism" cannot
refer to the United States of America. Two million American soldiers
were fighting on the Western front when, a few months ago, the armi-
stice was signed; several million more were waiting in America for their
turn to join the ranks of the allied armies in France. American in-
dustries and American savings made a supreme effort to brace up the

314 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

allied cause, and the war was won. Go to Paris now and watch the
proceedings at the peace conference, as I was doing during the last
seven weeks, and you will find that America asks for no territories,
for no mandates, and for no onerous compensations. It is the only-
great power there which preaches moderation, and demands unre-
servedly full justice for the little nations. Yugoslav Dalmatia, Istria,
Goricia, and Fiume had been, in a period of stress, bartered away by
some of our allies; America is to-day the only fearless champion of
your claims to these Yugoslav lands. American men and women hast-
ened to every front, and there, amid many perils and discomforts,
they nursed the sick and the wounded. They fed the hungry and
clothed the naked and the destitute. This they did even before Amer-
ica had entered the world war. Need I remind you that it was an
American mission which, in 1915, saved Serbia from the destructive
ravages of typhus, and that several Americans, victims of these very
ravages, are now buried in Serbia's soil ? To-day you will find Ameri-
cans even in the countries of our former enemies, in Germany, Aus-
tria, and Hungary, doing the work of mercy and of charity. The name
of Hoover is just as well known and beloved in Vienna and Budapest
as it is in Belgium. A country of materialism cannot display that
spirit which America has displayed during this war. Let the idealism
of President Wilson remind you of American idealism.

The phrase "American materialism" is an invention of ill-informed
Europe; but the European who has lived in the United States, and
has had the good fortune to catch the spirit of America, revolts when-
ever he hears the untutored European mind utter that phrase. Read
the history of the United States from its earliest beginnings, when
the Pilgrim fathers landed at Plymouth Rock, three hundred j^ears
ago, and you will find that idealism runs through it from beginning
to end. The Pilgrim fathers themselves were idealists, who under-
took the perilous voyage "for the glory of God and the advancement
of the Christian faith."

A hundred and fifty years later the Continental Congress of the
colonies issued, at Philadelphia, the "Declaration of Colonial Rights,"
and this declaration, as well as the documents accompanying it and
addressed to the people of the United Kingdom and of British America,
breathes the spirit of lofty idealism. The same Congress in 1775 issued
another declaration, setting forth causes which forced the American
colonies to take up arms; and in 1776 it issued the Declaration of In-
dependence, which announced to the world the ideals for the attain-
ment of which the colonists were ready to sacrifice their lives. No
other human documents ever stated so clearly and so definitely the
"divine right of man" as these documents did. The men who com-

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 315

posed these documents were not ordinary men; they were idealists
of the highest type. Read the lives of Washington, Hamilton, Frank-
lin, Jay, Jefferson, and of other leaders of the American Revolutionary
period, and you will find what a wonderful power idealism has when
the destiny of a young nation hangs in the balance. But when the
struggle was over, after the victory had been won, the leader of the
new nation, immortal Washington, assumed the supreme executive
office of the land and retired from it after two terms of service with
a spirit of dignity and of humility which has no equal in human his-
tory. His Farewell Address to the American people, advocating the
practice of idealism by the cultivation of religion, morality, patriotism,
good faith, and justice toward all nations, is an echo of the voice of
idealism which was the driving power of the American Revolution.

The idealism of the Revolutionary period was the guiding star of
the American patriots of the stormy period preceding the Civil War.
One of them, Daniel Webster, was a youth of seventeen when Wash-
ington died, and he knew personally some of the great leaders of the
Revolutionary period, like Jefferson and Adams. He certainly caught
by direct contact the idealism of this period. Read his speeches, as
I have read them during my apprenticeship days in America, and you
will understand what I mean by American idealism, if this war has
not shown it to you better thaa any words of mine can do it. Web-
ster's idealism was in the hearts of men of his generation, who, under
the great leadership of Lincoln, one of the greatest among American
idealists, conducted the Civil War and preserved the American Union.
Lincoln's immortal words: "With malice toward none, with charity
for all," will forever remind the world of the idealism which was in
the hearts of the American people who fought for the preservation of
the American Union. President Wilson is one of the best biographers
of George Washington, and he also published a splendid study of the
constitutional government of the United States. No profound stu-
dent of these themes can escape becoming an exalted idealist. His
speeches, which during the World War he addressed to the American
people and to the whole world, are sermons on American idealism,
which have guided the people of the United States from the very be-
ginning of their history; but some of you in Europe never understood
it. The world war has made you eager to listen to every word which
inspires your anxious hearts with new hopes. President Wilson's words
and his acts at the Paris peace conference inspire you with these new
hopes, and hence this Wilson Day, an honor to him and a credit to
you. In honoring him you are honoring the idealism of the American
people, for which act I am most grateful to you.

It was here in Panchevo that I first heard of Benjamin Franklin,

316 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

nearly fifty years ago; to-day I deliver to you, people of Panchevo,
a greeting from Franklin's native land and a message that the culti-
vation of American idealism is the most powerful arm for the defense
of the destiny of your young nation.

Hamilton Fish Armstrong, our military attache in Bel-
grade at that time, was present at the meeting. He did
not understand a word of my address, because it was
delivered in Serbian, but he assured me that, judging by
appearances, it must have been at least as good as my
address in Princeton in the beginning of the World War
in 1914; he was then a senior at Princeton College. The
Princeton address was a eulogy of Serbian idealism, which
I had imported into America when I landed at Castle
Garden in 1874; the Panchevo address was a eulogy of
American idealism, which I had brought back to Pan-
chevo forty-five years later. I must confess, however,
that, twenty-five years earlier, the above address was de-
livered in substance to Protoyeray Zhivkovich, the poet-
priest of Panchevo, when after graduating at Columbia
in 1883 I returned for the first time to my native village.
On that occasion the poet said, and here I quote from
an earlier chapter of my narrative:

Tell your mother that I am happy to bear the whole responsibility
for your wandering away to distant America. It is no longer distant ;
it is now in my heart; you have brought America to us. It was a new
world in my terrestrial geography; it is now a new world in my spir-
itual geography.

I often think of these words now, and I firmly believe
that there are many millions of people in Europe to-day
who think that America is a new world in their spiritual
geography. The people in Panchevo, I am certain, think
so. But it needed a world war to eliminate from their
minds the old superstition that this is the land of "Amer-
ican materialism." The world pendulum has swung the
other way, and I often wonder whether we can live up
to the very high reputation which we enjoy in the opinion

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 317

of a large part of the world, which now knows our vir-
tues but does not know our shortcomings.

A short time after the Panchevo celebration, a num-
ber of scientists of the University of Belgrade, members
of the Royal Serbian Academy, invited me to an informal
conference, and asked me to tell them something about
American science and its National Research Council in
Washington. I do not think that on that occasion my
discourse on this most interesting topic impressed my
Serbian friends as strongly as my Panchevo discourse
did. For a long time after this conference I thought of
many things that I might have said, but did not say.
The more I thought about it the more I was dissatisfied.
I was informed several months after this conference that
one of the Serbian scientists present remarked to a mu-
tual friend that from my Panchevo address on American
idealism he had been led to believe that at the Belgrade
conference I would say something about idealism in Amer-
ican science. But I said nothing, and he inferred, there-
fore, that there could not be much idealism in American
science, a thing which he had always suspected. Many
European scientists suspected that long before he did.
That permissible inference of the Serbian scientist hurt
me, and it hurt the more because I felt that the omission
was unpardonable. But the psychology at the Panchevo
celebration was different from that at the conference in
Belgrade. In Panchevo a remark was made from which,
I was afraid, one might have inferred that this is a coun-
try of materialism. Nobody at the Belgrade conference
suggested the thought that American science might, per-
haps, have a taint of materialism. But, of course, no
Serbian scientist could have suggested such a thing when
the memory of the service of American science to Serbia
during the typhus ravages of 1915 was still fresh in every-
body's mind.

A. fireplace fed by slow-burning wood must be stirred

318 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

up often to maintain a lively flame. Similarly, the flame
of a slow mental combustion cannot be maintained with-
out occasional stirring. My mental combustion at the
Belgrade conference was certainly slow, and needed a
stirring up, similar to that which it received in Panchevo.
My early studies of American history and American tradi-
tions would have proceeded much more slowly, if it had
not been for my old friend Bilharz, who stirred me up
with his prejudices against American democracy, and
with his everlasting complaints against the imaginary
spectre which he called American materialism.

This stirring up is experienced by many American
citizens of foreign birth whenever they visit their native
land. Every one of these visits speeds up the Ameri-
canization process which is going on in them. I firmly
believe that the amalgamation of the foreign-born would
be speeded up wonderfully if we could make it obligatory
that every foreign-born American citizen should revisit
his native land at stated intervals of time. Had I not
visited my native land so many times since my landing
at Castle Garden in 1874, the memory of my early ex-
periences in America, described in the earUer parts of
this narrative, would probably have faded away com-
pletely long ago. Had I not visited Belgrade and Pan-
chevo in 1919 I should not have been stirred up on the
subject of American idealism, and particularly about the
American idealism in science. It was in Belgrade and
Panchevo where the stimulus was applied which revived
the memory of my experiences in Columbia College, in
the Universities of Cambridge and Berhn, and in my
professorial work at Columbia University, and made me
pass in rapid review through all my experiences which
have a bearing upon American idealism, and particularly
upon the ideahsm in American science. Ever since, I
have been revolving in my mind many of the things re-
lating to American science that I might have mentioned

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 319

at the Belgrade conference, but did not mention. The
painting, ^'Men of Progress," which I first saw at Cooper
Union in 1876, came back to my mind. The men repre-
sented in it, Uke Peter Cooper, McCormick, Goodyear,
Morse, and others, did not represent the ideahsm in
science which the Belgrade scientist had in mind; they
were practical inventors. They were the scientific idols
of the American people, but they were not idealists in
science. The time for ideahsm in American science had
not yet arrived. The Union Pacific Railroad had not
yet been built when that picture was painted; the West-
ern plains had not yet been compelled to yield their po-
tential treasures of golden grain; and the vast quantities
of coal and mineral ore were waiting anxiously to be raised
to the surface of the earth to serve in the development
of our vast territory between the Atlantic and the Pacific.
He who could aid the people in this gigantic development
became the idol of the people. The names of inventors,
like McCormick, Goodyear, and Morse, were household
words with the people of the United States, just as the
names of Edison and of Bell are to-day. Joseph Henry,
the famous scientist, was also in that historic painting,
but he was in the background of it. His expression
seemed to indicate that he did not feel quite at home in
a group of men who were practical inventors. He was a
friend of Lincoln, and his idealism in science was just
as exalted as Lincoln's ideahsm in political philosophy.
But in those days an idealist in science attracted little
attention among the people of the United States, who
were busily engaged in solving their numerous economic
problems. Hence Joseph Henry, the ideahst in science,
was practically unknown. This was the mental attitude
which Europe called '^American materiahsm" in science.
De Tocqueville, the famous French traveller and keen
observer, said this about us in a book which he pubUshed
over seventy years ago:

320 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

It must be confessed that, among the civilized peoples of our age,
there are few in which the highest sciences have made so little progress
as in the United States. . . . The future will prove whether the pas-
sion for profound knowledge, so rare and so fruitful, can be born and
developed so readily in democratic societies as in aristocracies. . . .
The man of the North . . . does not care for science as a pleasure,
and only embraces it with avidity when it leads to useful applications.

To-day this criticism sounds like a national libel, but
fifty years ago it was swallowed like a bitter pill which,
in the opinion of many patriotic thinkers, we needed if
we were to be cured of a malady which threatened to be-
come a national calamity. The greatest leaders of scien-
tific thought in this country pointed to our educational
system, in order to prove that de Tocqueville was right
and that science was neglected in our schools and col-.
leges. Foremost amongst them were, as I have already
pointed out in this narrative, Joseph Henry, President
Barnard, of Columbia, President White, of Cornell,
Draper, Youmans, and others. They were all ideahsts in
science, and when they invited Tyndall to this country,
fifty years ago, they invited the most eloquent apostle of
scientific idealism. The great movement for higher scien-
tific research, inaugurated in England by the immortal
Maxwell and his supporters, and in this country by the
great Joseph Henry and his followers, was a movement
for idealism in science, or, as Andrew White called it,
'^hope for higher endeavor. ''

When the European speaks of materialism in American
science, he is resurrecting notions which de Tocqueville
had in his mind when he wrote the lines quoted above.
These notions were correct, but wonderful changes have
taken place in this country since de Tocqueville wrote
his book. If he were living now and published another
edition of his famous book, I am sure that he would in-
sert a chapter which would speak of idealism and not
of materialism in American science.

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 321

What is the mental attitude which I call '^ idealism in
science"? Before answering this question it is well to
quote here from an earlier part of my narrative:

The eternal truth was, according to my understanding at that time,
the sacred background of Tyndall's scientific faith, and the works of
the great scientific discoverers, their Hves, and their methods of in-
quiry into physical phenomena were the only sources from which the
human mind can draw the light which will illuminate that sacred back-
ground. He nourished that faith with a religious devotion, and his
appeals in the name of that faith were irresistible. His friends in Amer-
ica and in England, who were glad to have him as their advocate of
the cause of scientific research, had the same faith that he had, and
they nourished it with the same devotion. I know to-day . . . that
this faith was kindled and kept alive ... by the hght of the life and
of the wonderful discoveries of Michael Faraday. ... He was their
contemporary, and his achievements, like a great search-light, showed
them the true path of scientific progress.

The worship of the eternal truth and the burning de-
sire to seek an ever-broadening revelation of it constitute
the mental attitude which I call 'idealism in science."
Its growth in the British Empire, and particularly at
the University of Cambridge, has been most remark-
able since the great movement started under the leader-
ship of Maxwell a little over fifty years ago. What prog-
ress have we made since Tyndall's visit to this country
in 1872? If in my narrative I succeed in answering this
question I shall be more than satisfied, and I shall cer-
tainly send a translation of it in part to my scientific
friends in Belgrade. It will tell them what I ought to
have told them four years ago.

I return now to the point in my story where I digressed.
The 14th of April, 1896, is recorded in my calendar as
a happy day. The 15th started with a balmy spring
morning full of glorious sunshine. The suggestion to
walk through Central Park to Columbia College to my
morning lecture could not be resisted, and I reached the

322 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

lecture-room full of the joy of life which fills the heart
of every healthy youth. My students told me later that
the first part of my lecture that morning displayed that
joy. But, near the end of the lecture, I suddenly col-
lapsed. A sudden chill struck me like a bolt from a clear
sky. Five days later my life hung in the balance; there
was a desperate struggle between a stout heart and the
busy poisons of dreaded pneumonia. The heart won
out. But when the crisis had passed, and my physician
thought that I was sufficiently strong to stand the shock
of terrible news, he told me that my wife had died several
days before, a victim of dreaded pneumonia. She had
caught the seed of this merciless disease while nursing
me. My weakened heart stood the shock, but every
one of my nerves seemed to snap in two. For the first
time in my Ufe I recognized the full meaning of will-power;
I recognized it because I knew that the spiritual motor,
the power of which I had always felt, was there no longer.
For the first time since leaving my native Idvor, twenty-
six years before, I had to be steered and looked after by
others. Life never looked so hopeless as it did during
that awful spring of 1896. But I wanted to live, because
I had a little daughter to bring up. That, in fact, was
the only thing that I wanted to hve for; everything else
seemed either devoid of interest, or much beyond my
reach. It is an awful thing to lose one's self-reliance.
Aims and aspirations appeared to me Hke httle toy bal-
loons that children play with; our nerves, I thought, are
the strings which keep them afloat within the reach of
our vision. When these strings snap in two, our aims
and aspirations, like toy balloons, disappear rapidly into
thin air.

My physician recommended that during that summer
I should settle down in Norfolk, Connecticut, to give
the bracing climate of this New England town in the
Berkshire hills a chance to rebuild what overwork, under

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 323

nervous tension, and pneumonia had undermined and
torn down. A New York physician, who knew me
through my X-ray work, offered to rent me his summer
residence, facing Haystack Mountain, the highest peak
in Norfolk, and I accepted it. This mountain is really
only a hill, hardly one thousand feet higher than the road
at its foot, but as I sat on the piazza in front of that little
cottage and looked at the so-called observatory, a square
frame structure on the top of this hill, from which people
caught the distant view of the Housatonic valley, I won-
dered whether I should ever be strong enough to climb
to its top. I recalled my exploits in Switzerland, thir-
teen years before, and, utterly discouraged by the com-
parison, I accepted with calm resignation that I had
grown old and decrepit in less time than it takes other
people to become middle-aged. Whenever I thought
of my past, present, or future, I always managed to draw
some gloomy conclusion of that kind, and, so far as my
cloudy fancy could see, I felt that I had finished my
career in dismal failure. People told me that these were
queer notions due to mental depression, from which I
would soon recover. But, as time went on and there
was no relief, I resented it when people tried to console
me with, what I considered, empty promises of a brighter
future. There suddenly appeared an angel who promised
nothing but gave much.

Another New York physician, the well-known Doctor
Frederick Shepard Dennis, also an admirer of my X-ray
work, had a summer residence at Norfolk. He was prac-
tically a native of this quaint New England town, and
beUeved in its great virtues as a resort for convalescents.
He was very anxious that my summer vacation there
should put me on my feet again, but he saw that my in-
trospective life on the lonely piazza facing Haystack
Mountain blocked every road which might lead to my
physical and mental restoration. ^^ Professor," said he

324 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

one day to me, '^if you do not stop thinking about your-
self you will never get well.'' ^^But," said I, ^'what else
is there to think about ? I hate to think about that hor-
rible green phosphorescence of vacuum tubes, about the
X-rays, fluorescent screens, and skeletons of hands and
feet and ribs. Those are the things which haunted in-
cessantly my burning brain during the pneumonia fever,
and I shall never think of them again if I can help it. I
should like to think about some other problems which
are waiting in my laboratory, but what is the use? I
have no hope of living long enough to solve them, or
that, if I live, I shall have the necessary brain energy
to work out their solution. Besides, whenever I begin
to think of something pleasant or interesting my heart
suddenly gives a violent thump, and sends a cold shiver
through my timid veins. I must think of myself, be-
cause I am always on my guard against something that
might happen at any moment to cut the last thread of
my shaky vitality. It is this everlasting fear that keeps
me thinking about myself." The good doctor looked
thoughtful, but said nothing; a few days later he drove
up in a little yellow runabout, drawn by a pair of cobs
of beautiful dark chestnut color, which were a splendid
product of his stud farm; they shone like old mahogany.
''How do you like them, professor?" asked the doctor, as
he scrutinized my admiring gaze. ''They are a thing of
beauty and a joy forever," said I, and I meant what I
said. The next day the cobs, with wagon and harness,
were mine; they were only three years old, and, although
broken to harness, they were quite raw and needed train-
ing. I got them after pledging my word to the doctor
that I would train them. My native Banat is like Ken-
tucky. Everybody raises horses, and everybody knows
by intuition how to handle a horse. I was told by ex-
perts that I handled those cobs just right. While train-
ing them I really trained my own nerves. They needed

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 325

it more than the cobs did. '^ Horse sense" has meant to
me ever since a sense which enables man to train a horse,
and that means to give up your whole heart and soul
to the horse. The trainer must never think of himself,
but always of his beloved animal. He must be patient
and persistent, kind and affectionate, forgiving mistakes
and showing full appreciation for even the smallest honest
effort. Only by the exercise of these virtues can he suc-
ceed in developing in the horse the habit of being a splen-
did horse. Doctor Dennis was a great lover of horses,
and he knew all that, and thought, as he told me later,
that it was the best medicine for me.

My cobs acquired the best of habits, and at the end of
a year they were two beautifully balanced animals, carry-
ing their proud heads on high, and stepping up in per-
fect unison. They seemed, when in full action, to be
anxious to strike their foreheads with their knees. To
sit behind those animals, and watch their swaggering
motion around the horse-show ring, gave a thrill never
to be forgotten. The New York horse-show in Madison
Square Garden, in the autumn of 1897, and the Phila-
delphia horse-show at Wissahickon, in the spring of 1898,
established the great reputation of Comet and Princess
Rose, the cobs that I had been training during eighteen
months. They won many prizes, but none of them was
as welcome as the prize of my restored health. I got
well without knowing that I was getting well; the only
improvement that I w^as watching and thinking about
was the improvement of my beautiful cobs, but, never-
theless, my laboratory assistant Cushman noticed in
the early spring of 1897 that I had already begun to speak
much more encouragingly about some of my old labora-
tory problems; he noticed it, and he was happy again.
The X-ray problems were not among them; I never re-
covered from the feeling of horror which the thought of
them gave me during m.y sickness in April, 1896.

326 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Reginald Rives, one of the social leaders of New York,
was the judge at Wissahickon who awarded the prizes
to my cobs. We had been in college together, but when
he saw me at the horse-show he did not recognize me at
first, because, as he informed me later, he did not expect
to see a college professor driving high-steppers at a horse-
show. He spoke very highly of my cobs, which won from
a competitor like millionaire Widener's stable in Phila-
delphia.

^^Pupin," exclaimed Rives, ^4f you can handle your
students as well as you can handle your cobs, you are
the greatest professor in America." ^'I could," said I,
^'ii 1 had to handle only two students at a time, but not
two hundred." Rives repeated this remark to his brother,
a trustee of Columbia University, and the trustee saw in
it quite a chunk of educational philosophy. The pre-
ceptorial system at Princeton reminds one of this phi-
losophy. Will the American colleges ever adopt it?

A famous Boston lover of horses, a Mr. Jordan, saw
my cobs at the Wissahickon horse-show and made me
a handsome bid for them in cash besides ^ throwing in"
a very handsome Irish hunter which had won a prize in
the jumping class. The hunter became my saddle-horse,
and served me loyally for fully twelve years. No better
saddle-horse ever cantered over the hillsides of Litchfield
County than Clipper, the Irish hunter, my trusty friend
and companion, particularly during my srnnmer vaca-
tions. Thanks to Comet and Princess Rose, and to good
old Clipper, and to the bracing climate of Norfolk hills,
the joy of life returned again.

My first job after landing at Castle Garden was on
a farm, and there I had vowed that as soon as I could
afford it I would buy myself a real American farm. A
httle over twenty years later, in 1897, I bought a farm
at Norfolk; this blessed spot, where I regained my health
and happiness, became my real American home, and J

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 327

have never had a desire to seek a better haven of happi-
ness in any other place, either here or in Europe.

The native of Norfolk is a typical Connecticut Yankee,
Neither the wealth nor the social position of a new sum-
mer visitor can faze him. His dignity and self-respect
forbid him to kowtow to any city swell. You will get
his respectful attention if you deserve it; but you must
earn it by your acts at Norfolk. You cannot command
it by the power of anything you bring with you from the
city to your summer vacation. While you are in Nor-
folk in summer, you are a summer boarder, an outsider,
with traditions back of you which no native of Norfolk
knows anything about. The force of all this was once so
strongly impressed upon me that I never forgot it.

Norfolk, like every New England town, has its annual
town meetings, when the accounts of the town for the
closing current year are carefully analyzed, appropria-
tions are made for the coming year, and the selectmen
and other administrative officers are elected. After I
had become a landowner in Norfolk, I attended these
town meetings regularly, and took part in their discus-
sions, and there for the first time I became acquainted,
by personal contact, with the fundamental elements of
Anglo-Saxon civilization. At one of those town meet-
ings I urged the improvement of the public highways,
using the argument that better roads would attract more
summer residents from the great cities and, I was cer-
tain, would advance the prosperity of the town. My
arguments were received with respectful silence, and no
sooner had I finished my speech than a Mr. Nettleton,
the oldest voter in the township, got up and, turning
his black goggles toward me, addressed me somewhat as
follows :

''Our roads are just as good as they ever were; our
ancestors taught us how to take care of them, and they
are good enough for us. You say that if we improve them

328 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

we would get more summer visitors, who, with their
wealth, would increase the prosperity of our town. We
don't care for that kind of prosperity; it brings vanity
and false pride into our New England homes, which you
city people carry around with you." Then, pointing his
trembling finger at me, the old man exclaimed: ''You,
particularly, are guilty of this offense; you were the first
who showed our simple people here how to swagger about
this town on a horse with a rabbit tail."

He referred to the almost universal custom at that
time of docking a horse's tail; the tails of my famous cobs
as well as of my saddle-horse Clipper had been docked.
After this speech, I suspended my propaganda for more
up-to-date roads. Two years later, another incident
occurred which is worth relating here. Mr. Carter, a
Norfolk hunter of much local fame, had a fine pointer
dog. He went to Europe one summer and left his dog
in charge of a friend. But the dog ran away, and chased
through all the woods of Norfolk, looking for his master.
One day he came to my house; he was hungry, thirsty,
tired out, and perfectly unhappy, having failed to find
his master. I petted him, gave him fresh water to drink
and some food to eat, and, while he was feasting, spoke
to him and paid him many compliments on account of
his affectionate attachment to his master. After his
hearty meal he fell asleep near my feet on the piazza,
and when he woke up he looked at me and seemed to be
a much happier dog. From that moment on he followed
me everywhere, running after my horse when I went out
riding. One day I was cantering slowly along the road
passing old Nettleton's house. I saw the old man stand-
ing near the road, apparently waiting for somebody.
When I was quite near him he beckoned me to stop, which
I did, and he addressed me:

"Professor, I was very severe with you two years ago
at that town meeting. But I did not know you ; now I
do. That dog there would not stay with anybody in this

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 329

town, but he stays with you, and he follows you just as
he followed his master. You are good to him, and the
dog knows it. I have great confidence in a dog's judg-
ment, and I know now that you are a good man, just
as good as any of the folks in this here New England
town." Then, stretching out his bony hand to me, he
said: ^^ Shake, forgive and forget, and let us be good
friends. I shall never oppose you again at our annual
town meetings. What's good for you is good enough for
me and for our little town.''

No offer of friendship was ever more welcome to me,
and there never was a friendship of which I was more
proud. Before many days had passed, the natives of
Norfolk, from the illustrious Eldridge family, the angels
of the town, down to the most humble day-laborer, felt
the same toward me as old Nettleton did; that is, I al-
ways thought so, and I have never had any reason to
think otherwise. No resolution moved by me at the an-
nual town meetings ever failed to pass, but I always
moved slowly, and not until I was quite sure that the
motion was in the right direction. I would sooner have
risked losing the good opinion of the trustees of Columbia
University than that of the good people of Norfolk, my
American Idvor. During my summer vacations in Nor-
folk, I have always felt just as much at home, and as
happy and contented, as I did in my native Idvor when,
during my student days in Europe, I spent my summer
vacations there. Whenever I returned to my laboratory
from my summer vacation in the bracing atmosphere of
Norfolk, I have always felt that no problem there could
resist the force of my stored-up nervous energy. That
feeling early encouraged me in the belief that I had com-
pletely recovered from the breakdown of the spring of
1896, and this belief gave wings to every new effort.

When the news of the discovery of the Roentgen rays
reached me in December of 1895, I was busy with the

330 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

research of a problem which I had taken up in 1894, while
making a foot tour in Switzerland. This is the problem
which I took up again after the recovery from the break-
down of 1896. I must confess here that I never returned
to X-ray research, because for a long time after my ill-
ness even the sight of an X-ray tube made me almost
hysterical.

During the first half of the summer of 1894, Mrs. Pupin
and I were staying at a little hotel on Lake Wannensee
in Switzerland ; I was preparing my lectures on the mathe-
matical theory of sound. Lord Rayleigh's treatise called
my attention to the classical problem which ten years
before I first saw in La Grange's famous treatise. I had
bought it second-hand in Paris, and had studied it in
my mother's garden at Idvor. The problem was a hypo-
thetical one relating to an imaginary and not to a real
physical case. It may be stated as follows:

A string without weight is stretched like a violin string
between two fixed points; at equidistant intervals along
this string are attached equal weights, say bird-shot.
The problem is, how will this string, loaded with weights,
vibrate when disturbed by an impulse ? La Grange found
a beautiful solution for this historic problem, and the
solution marks the beginning of an epoch in the history of
mathematical physics. This solution enabled him to ana-
lyze mathematically the vibrations of a violin string, one
of the famous mathematical problems of the eighteenth
century. I made a bold attempt to find a solution for
a more general and less hypothetical form of this problem.
I supposed that the string itself had weight, and that it,
as well as the little weights attached to it, moved through
a viscous medium. I felt intuitively what the solution
should be, and considered it of much scientific importance.
I finally found the most general mathematical solution
of this generalized problem, and the beauty of it was
that it could be stated in a very simple language. I shall

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 331

state it later. The solution was exactly what I had ex-
pected it to be, and it thrilled me more than any work
that I had ever done. I always believed that my train-
ing in ground-signalling which the herdsman of Idvor
had taught me some twenty years before was respon-
sible for this intuitive guess. Early impressions, par-
ticularly those relating to novel scientific facts, are very
intense.

I was much encouraged by the thought that I was able
to add very substantially to the solution of a historic
problem first solved by famous La Grange. In order to
communicate some of my joy to Mrs. Pupin, I told her that
I was ready to give up mathematical reading for the rest
of that summer, and we started on a drive through Switzer-
land. That is, she drove, while I walked a good part of
the time, particularly when the carriage was moving
along the zigzag roads going up to a pass, which happens
often in Switzerland drives. Making short cuts, I met
her every now and then on the up-grade parts of the steep
and winding roads, and rode with her on the down-grade.
During these walks, being alone, I pondered a great deal
about my solution of the generalized La Grangian prob-
lem. One day, while climbing up to the Furka pass, it
occurred to me that since the motion of electricity
through a wire experiences reacting forces similar to
those in the motion of the material elements in a
stretched string, my generalized solution should be appli-
cable to the motion of electricity, and I was immediately
aware that I had made a very important invention. I
tried to convince Mrs. Pupin of it, but she said: ^'I will
believe what you say and will gladly congratulate you
if you will promise that you will not be absent-minded
during the rest of our trip." I promised, but it was very
difficult to live up to the promise. I never told her how
often I longed to be back in my modest laboratory in
the musty cellar under President Low's office at Colum-

332 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

bia College, and that too in spite of the heavenly beauty
of the views which on my walks met me on every turn
of the winding roads which lead up to the wonderful
passes of Switzerland. I was most anxious to submit
my theory to an experimental test. When our tour in
Switzerland was finished I had every detail of the pro-
posed experimental tests worked out in my head, and
yet my good wife never accused me of being absent-
minded. In less than a year from that time I had finished
my first rough test, and was preparing for a more elabo-
rate investigation when the discovery of the X-ray was
announced, at the very end of 1895, and I, like every-
body else, dropped everything and eagerly sought in-
formation about this wonderful discovery. It was the
work I dropped then which I took up again after my
recovery from the breakdown of 1896.

Now what is the invention which occurred to me first
on my walk to the Furka pass in Switzerland in the sum-
mer of 1894? A bit of scientific history is connected
with it, which I shall tell here briefly:

A vibrating motion of electricity at one end of a long
wire is propagated along the wire in much the same way
as the vibratory motion of a rope or string is propagated
from one of its terminals to the other. This propagation
of electrical motion from one end of a long conducting
wire to the other was first investigated by Professor Wil-
liam Thomson, the late Lord Kelvin, of the University
of Glasgow, in 1855, when the first Atlantic cable was
projected. He worked out the problem for electrical
signalhng over a submarine cable, and three years later
Kirchhoff, who was one of my teachers in Berlin, worked
it out for telegraphic signalling over land-Unes stretched
over poles. When telephony was invented in 1876, there
was, of course, a demand for a mathematical theory of
telephonic transmission over long conducting wires. He
who understood Thomson's and Kirchhoff's work could

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 333

experience no serious difficulty in working it out. Vaschy,
a Frenchman, and Heaviside, an Englishman, were the
first to work it out; they did it in the chronological order
just indicated, Vaschy leading Heaviside by about two
years. They both observed that just as in cable and
land-line telegraphy so also in telephony the reduction
of the transmitted electrical force was the smaller the
larger the so-called inductance of the transmitting wire.
Many people believe that this observation was an im-
portant discovery; I never thought so, because I believed
that Thomson's and Kirchhoff's work made that observa-
tion obvious. But, however that may be, the observation
was made by Vaschy two years before it was made by
Heaviside, and neither one nor the other saw in it a spe-
cial case of a general physical principle, which the Allies
appreciated much during the World War in their strug-
gles against the submarines. I shall describe it briefly:

Sound is transmitted through water or through a solid
much more efficiently than it is through air. I knew
that, when, as herdsman's assistant in Idvor, I learned
the art of signalling through the ground. Now why
should water or hard and heavy ground transmit sound
better than air does? Idvor's herdsman did not tell me
that, but, having gained the knowledge of the fact very
early, I was prepared to seize upon the dynamical ex-
planation as soon as I needed it; and I felt the need of
it in Switzerland in the summer of 1894.

Transmission of sound means transmission of vibratory
motion from one element of a substance to the contiguous
elements. The element which transmits its vibratory
energy acts and the elements which receive it react. Each
element is capable of exerting three reacting forces. One
is against the change of velocity of its motion, that is,
against change of momentum. This reaction is called
the kinetic reaction, and, as I have pointed out before, it
was discovered by Galileo three hundred years ago. The

334 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

second reaction is against the elastic compression of the
receiving element. It is called the elastic reaction, and
was discovered by Hook, a contemporary of Newton,
two hundred years ago. The third is a frictional reac-
tion, the knowledge of which is very old. There are,
therefore, three forms of energy generated in the reacting
element of every vibrating body by the work of the act-
ing element. The first reaction results in energy of mo-
tion of the mass of the reacting element; the second one
results in the energy of its elastic compression; and the
third one generates heat. The first and the second are
energies of sound vibration and are transmitted again to
the contiguous elements, but the third is not a vibratory
sound energy and is not transmitted as such; it remains
as heat and represents the reduction of sound energy
transmitted from any one part to the contiguous parts.
It is obvious that this reduction will be, relatively, the
smaller the greater the first two reactions are in com-
parison with the frictional reaction. Heavy, incompres-
sible bodies, like water, metals, or hard solid ground,
have incomparably greater kinetic and elastic reactions
than air, hence they transmit sound much better than
air does. This physical principle did splendid service
during the World War in submarine and subterranean
detection by sound. The herdsman's assistants in Idvor,
when I was a boy, profited much from it in their signalling
through the ground. I am not aware that Vaschy and
Heaviside had a clear knowledge of it. If I am correct,
then it is quite remarkable that Serb peasants should
have been cognizant of a physical principle which was
probably unknown to English and French savants, hke
Vaschy and Heaviside.

Passing now by analogy from motion of matter to mo-
tion of electricity, we can, speaking figuratively, state
that vibratory motion of electricity will be transmitted
from one end of a conducting wire to the other the more

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 335

efficiently the heavier and the less compressible that elec-
tricity is, or, dropping now our figurative mode of speech,
we can say that, other things being equal, the higher the
kinetic and the elastic reaction of the moving electricity
the more efficiently will the energy of its vibratory mo-
tion be transmitted over the wire. But that means that
the inductance of the wire should be made as large and
its capacity as small as possible. That much was per-
fectly obvious in Thomson's and Kirchhoff's work, some
twenty years before Vaschy and Heaviside took up the
mathematical theory of telephonic transmission. These
two celebrated mathematicians, however, deserve much
credit for their enthusiastic backing of inductance among
the sceptical telephone engineers, who, at that time, knew
little of the mathematical theory and of the general prin-
ciple of transmission of vibratory motions.

A coil of wire wound around an iron core is the first
picture in our mind when we hear inductance mentioned.
Hence, if inductance increases the efficiency of trans-
mission in a telephone transmission-line, and you cannot
introduce it into the line in large amounts in any other
way, then one would certainly suggest putting a lot of
coils into the telephone-line and examining the results of
this haphazard guess. Vaschy tried this guess, and failed.
The late Mr. Pickernell, chief engineer of the long-dis-
tance department of the American Telephone and Tele-
graph Company, also tried it, and he also failed. It was
obvious that, as Heaviside expressed it, experiment gave no
encouragement with regard to inductance introduced in
this way. I tried it and found that experiment offered very
much encouragement to inductance introduced this way;
I succeeded, because I did not guess; I was guided by the
mathematical solution of the generalized La Grangian
problem. What does this solution say when applied to
electrical motions in a wire ? It says this : Place your in-
ductance coils into your telephone-line at such distances

336 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

apart that for all vibratory motions of electricity which it
is desirable to transmit there shall be several coils per
wave-length. In telephonic transmission of speech that
means one coil every four or five miles on overhead
wires, and one coil in about every one to two miles in a
telephone cable. For these wave-lengths, the wire pos-
sessing discreet lumps of inductance in the form of in-
ductance-coils acts like a wire with uniformly distributed
inductance. Such a wire transmits efficiently according
to the general physical principle described above. In or-
der to illustrate this by a mechanical analogy, we can say
that a light silk cord stretched between two fixed points
and carrying at equidistant points heavy bird-shot will
act like a heavy uniform cord for all vibratory motions
the wave-length of which embraces several intervals sepa-
rating the bird-shot, and will transmit these motions much
more efficiently from one end of the cord to the other than
if the bird-shot were not there. This simple experiment
with bird-shot and a long stretched cord can easily be
tried ; it is a very inexpensive experiment and will convince
you even if you know nothing about the mathematical
elements of the problem. This is the simple experiment
which I had in my head during my tramping along the
•zigzag roads in Switzerland in 1894. A professor of
physics, who often acted as consulting physicist to tele-
phone companies, had such a loaded cord hung up over his
lecture-room table for the purpose of explaining transmis-
sion of wave-motion from one end of the cord to the other,
but he never inferred anything from it regarding loading a
telephone-line with inductance-coils. When I called his
attention to it, and joked about it, he blamed his hard luck,
implying, I thought, that solving a dynamical problem and
building upon the foundation of this solution an electrical
invention is a question of luck.

From the simple apparatus, just referred to, to the
elaborate electrical demonstrations which would convince

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 337

stubborn and hard-headed telephone engineers, was a
very long pull. The most embarrassing feature in these
demonstrations was that I could not afford large expen-
ditures of money to carry them out on actual telephone
conductors; besides, it would have been unwise to dis-
close to interested parties, the owners of long-distance
telephone-lines, a theory for which I had not yet obtained
a satisfactory experimental proof. I had to invent
laboratory apparatus equivalent to telephone lines or
cables of great length, which would enable me to do all
the experimenting in my laboratory. That required al-
most as much thought, inventive effort, and mathematical
achievement as the solution of the extended La Grangian
problem.

The first part of my research I communicated to the
American Institute of Electrical Engineers in March,
1899. It dealt only with the mathematical theory of my
laboratory apparatus. It spoke a great deal about La
Grange, but nothing directly about the invention. In
October of that year, a friend of mine, Doctor Gary
T. Hutchinson, told me that he suspected that an inven-
tion was hidden in that conoLmunication. '^If you have
detected it, others have detected it also, and are by this
time in the Patent Office," said I. ^^Are you not there
yourself?" asked Hutchinson, looking somewhat dis-
turbed, and when he heard that I was not he looked dis-
couraged. When, however, I declared my readiness to
undertake to design for some clients of his a telephone
cable to operate between New York and Boston, guaran-
teeing to employ a wire not bigger than in ordinary cables
capable of operating satisfactorily over a distance of
only twenty miles, Hutchinson grew quite serious, and
advised me to apply for a patent before doing anj^thing
else. I finally followed his advice, and not any too soon.
There were others, besides Hutchinson, who had recog-
nized that in my comLmunication to the Amercian Insti-

338 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

tute of Electrical Engineers there was hidden an invention
for which telephone engineers had been eagerly waiting
ever since the birth of the telephone art. This created an
interference in the Patent Office which annoyed me, but
not nearly so much as I had been annoyed there before.
About a year from the date of my application for patent,
the American Telephone and Telegraph Company ac-
quired my American patent rights, treating me most
generously. It gave me what I asked ; my friends thought
that I had not asked enough, but to a native of Idvor a
dollar looks much bigger than to a native of New York
who may be a next-door neighbor to some Morgan or
Rockefeller. Besides, the opinion of the highest tele-
phone authority in the world that my solution of the
extended La Grangian problem had a very important
technical value was much more gratifying to me than all
the money in the world.

In Europe, and particularly in England, the invention
came as a surprise; they did not expect an American to
make an invention which required so much mathematical
analysis of electrical motions, to which the American
physicist had contributed very little, whereas Vaschy
and Heaviside had written volumes about it. But these
writers had paid too little attention to classical writers Uke
La Grange, Thomson, and Kirchhoff . The construction
of the inductance-coil required almost as much mathe-
matical analysis as the dynamical theory of the invention,
and the method of testing it also was new to the telephone
engineers. The coil is now known all over the world as
the Pupin coil, and many people think that the coil itself
is the invention.

When it became known that I had studied at the Uni-
versities of Cambridge and of Berhn, my English and
German friends claimed the credit of the invention for
the scientific training which I had received at their uni-
versities. I think the French had a better claim, because

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 339

it was La Grange who helped me more than any other
mathematical reading. As a matter of fact, the engineers
of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company and
the herdsmen of Idvor deserve most of the credit. The
first formulated the problem the solution of which led to
the invention, and the second taught me the art of signal-
ling through the ground which guided me to the physical
principle which underlies the invention.

A vice-president of the American Telephone and Tele-
graph Company, who is a very high authority in teleph-
ony, informed me recently that one way to describe,
roughly, the value of the invention is as follows: If dur-
ing the past twenty-two years his company had been
compelled to extend its network of conductors so as to
give, without employing my invention, the same service
which it is giving to-day, it would have had to spend at
least one hundred million dollars more than it has ac-
tually expended. But after quoting him I wish to call
attention to a fact which the public often overlooks. I
ask, where are those one hundred million dollars which
the invention has saved ? I know that not even a micro-
scopic part of them is in the pockets of the inventor. I
have figured out also, with the same accuracy with which
I once figured out the invention, that those hundred mil-
lion dollars are not in the pockets of the telephone com-
pany. They must be, therefore, in the pockets of the
American public. The invention made it possible to give
the telephone service, which is now being given, at a lower
rate than would have been possible if one hundred mil-
lion dollars more had been spent. Every good invention
benefits the public immeasurably more than it benefits
the inventor or the corporation which exploits the in-
vention. I certainly consider myself a public benefactor,
and the National Institute of Social Sciences called me
so when it gave me a gold medal almost as big as the
full moon. But this gift would have made me much

340 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

more happy if the institute had at the same time given
another gold medal to the American Telephone and
Telegraph Company.

Some fifteen years ago, when Frederick P. Fish, the
famous patent attorney, was the president of the Amer-
ican Telephone and Telegraph Company, I asked him
in the course of a conversation whether he would like to
sell me back my invention. *^Yes," said he, ^'but only
if you will buy the whole telephone company with it.
Our whole plant has been adjusted to the invention, and
when one goes the other also must go. The invention has
enabled us to detect many defects in our transmission
system, and if it had done nothing else than that it would
have been worth at least ten times what we paid you. It
is the greatest faultfinder that we ever struck, and it is
the only form of faultfinder for which we have any use.'*
A progressive industrial organization courts the criticism
of an accurate and friendly faultfinder. It leads to re-
search and development, and that supplies the vital
energy to every industry. Twenty-five years ago the
American Telephone and Telegraph Company had a small
laboratory in Boston, where it did all its scientific research
and development. But, presently, faultfinders like my
inventions moved into the peaceful and drowsy precincts
of that tiny laboratory, and stirred up the engineers and
the board of directors. I am very happy whenever I
think that, possibly, my inventions have contributed
some to this healthful stirring up. What was the result ?
To-day the American Telephone and Telegraph Company
and the affiliated Western Electric Company employ
about three thousand persons at an expenditure of some
nine million dollars annually in their research and de-
velopment work. The scientific research work at our
universities looks very modest in comparison with opera-
tions of this kind. Young men of the highest academic
training and splendid talents are busy day and night ex-

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 341

ploring the hidden treasures on the boundary-hnes be-
tween the various sciences and the science and art of
telephony, and their discoveries, I am sure, are the best
investment of this great industrial organization. For
instance, their development of the many details in my
invention have been wonderful, and give testimony of
the highest kind to the excellence of their scientific re-
search. It is not so much the occasional inventor who
nurses a great art like telephony and makes it grow be-
yond all our expectations, as it is the intelligence of a
well-organized and liberally supported research laboratory.
When I think of that I am perfectly convinced that very
few of the great advances in the telephone art would have
happened under government ownership. That explains
why telephony is practically dead in most European coun-
tries. What little life it has in Europe is due to the
American research in the above-mentioned laboratories.

The General Electric Company, The Westinghouse
Company, the Eastman Kodak Company, and many
other industrial corporations in this country are support-
ing similar research and development laboratories, where
scientific men of the highest training are busily exploring
what Helmlioltz called the rich territories near the bound-
ary-Unes of the various sciences and of the science form-
ing the foundation of their respective industries. This
reminds me of what I saw on a much smaller scale in
Germany, nearly forty years ago, when I was a student
there. We copied Germany's good example, but are
leading now, and the pace is so swift that Europeans are
dropping behind us very rapidly. The spirit of scientific
research has moved into our universities, and from the
universities it has moved into our industrial organiza-
tions. Industrial research is making bigger and bigger
demands upon the universities for highly trained scientific
research men; the demand is larger than the supply, and
because the industries can pay much higher salaries than

342 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the universities can much difficulty has been experienced
in inducing bright and promising young scientists to
pursue the academic career of a teacher. The quahty of
the scientific teacher in the university is temporarily de-
teriorating, that of the industrial research scientist is
steadily rising; on the whole, however, the country is a
gainer. The university man in the industries will trans-
plant there the scientific idealism of the university. The
captains of our leading industries already admit, as will
be pointed out below, that the cultivation of scientific
idealism is the best policy for our American industries.
Listen to the papers which are read by their research men
and you will see that the industries actually practise the
new gospel of scientific idealism which they are preaching.
But I must not depart too far from the main thread of
my story. When it became known that the American
Telephone and Telegraph Company had acquired the
rights to my high inductance wave conductors, all kinds of
legends were told about the invention and the fabulous
price paid for it. Newspapers love legends, because the
public loves them. The public is a child which loves to
listen to fairy-tales. The only good that this pubhcity
did was to help me sell my inventions relating to elec-
trical tuning and rectification in wireless telegraphy.
These lay idle for quite a number of years, and waited
for further developments in the wireless art before they
could be employed to advantage. Electrical tuning and
electrical rectification are fundamental operations in the
radio art to-day, but the wireless telegraphy of the early
days is a distant and poor relation of our present radio
art. The world had to wait quite some time for new dis-
coveries which gave birth to the epoch-making inventions
of new men, like Lee De Forest and Major E. H. Arm-
strong. It had to wait also for the great industrial re-
search laboratories before electrical tuning and rectifica-
tion could come into their own. In the early days of

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 343

wireless telegraphy I suggested several novel develop-
ments which might give a fair chance to tuning and
rectification, but I attracted scarcely any attention.
The legends just mentioned made people a little more
attentive.

One morning a man stepped suddenly into my office
at Columbia, and introduced himself as Mr. Green, or-
ganizer and promoter of the Marconi Company of Amer-
ica. He was full of action and looked Hke business.
''Are your wireless inventions for sale?" asked Mr.
Green, without much preliminary talk. ''They are,'' I
answered, and I felt that my heart was quivering on ac-
count of the unexpected blow which this laconic question
had given it. "How much?" asked Mr. Green. I gave
him the first figure that came into my head, and he, not
a bit daunted, asked whether I would take one-half in
cash and one-half in stock. I asked him twenty-four
hours to decide. "All right," said he, and promised to
call again the next day at the same hour. I should have
been perfectly satisfied to accept the cash offer and
close the deal even without the stock, but I was afraid
that any over-anxiety on my part might scare him away.
The next day he called and the deal was closed, he mak-
ing a certain cash payment immediately and I agreeing
to furnish certain documents before the final payment
was made. I was fairly well acquainted with trading
transactions in my native land; my father often took me
to market-places where he bought and sold cattle and
horses. I remember well the never-ending bartering
which very often ended in a fizzle. The nearer you get
to Constantinople the worse becomes the custom of this
Oriental method of trading. Mr. Green had none of that
Orientalism, and his utter indifference to the figures in-
volved in the deal astonished me. He also took it for
granted that I could and would perform all the fine things
which I promised to perform; that was very flattering to

344 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

me, but I was too much of an Oriental to accept, with-
out some apprehension, his apparently implicit trust
in me.

This reminds me of an incident which happened eight
years ago. The Serbian Government cabled me to make
a contract for five thousand tons of lard; I was its only
diplomatic and consular representative in America during
the war. I called up the representatives of Swift and of
Armour and told them over the telephone what was
wanted, requesting them to file their bids in forty-eight
hours. Two days later I met them in my office and some
Serbian war commissioners happened to be present. The
contract was closed in less than thirty minutes, and when
I told the commissioners that it involved one million
dollars they crossed themselves in utter amazement. In
Belgrade, they assured me, the closing of such a contract
would have required at least a month. I astonished them
as much as Mr. Green had astonished me, and the lard
transaction reminded me strongly of my deal with the
Marconi Company of America. Of course, lard handled
by Swifts or Armours is a much simpler proposition than
a lot of belated inventions relating to electrical tuning
and electrical rectification for which there was not yet a
crying demand.

A few months after my deal with Green I was in Berlin,
by invitation, for the purpose of negotiating, for my tele-
phone invention, a business agreement with the famous
electrical firm of Siemens and Halske. It was founded by
Werner von Siemens, whom I had met fifteen years be-
fore through the kind introduction of my teacher, Ex-
cellenz von Helmholtz. During the negotiations which
lasted one month I met the directors of this corporation
in almost daily conferences, which lasted never less than
an hour and very often several hours. Every detail of
my invention was thoroughly discussed both from the
purely scientific and from the engineering side, in its re-

roEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 345

lation to the earlier publications which had a bearing upon
it, in its legal aspects as determined by the German patent
laws; and finally the financial side was carefully con-
sidered and definitely settled. There was no bartering of
any kind, neither was anything taken for granted. Con-
trary to our American custom, the negotiations were di-
rectly between the inventor and the scientific experts.
The lawyers had very little to say, and spoke only when
the experts needed and asked for their opinion. When I
recall my negotiations with the American Telephone and
Telegraph Company, I remember nothing but law^^ers.
The negotiations w^ith Siemens and Halske recall scientific
experts only; the negotiations with the Marconi Company
of America recall only Green. At the close of the Berlin
conferences and negotiations I was perfectly certain that
I had accomplished something; I understood my invention
better than I had ever understood it before, and I was
perfectly certain that the scientists of Siemens and Halske
understood it just as well. Their popular descriptions of
it were better than anything I had ever done myself.
They also gave it a new name, and called telephone con-
ductors employing the invention " pupinizierte linien.'^
The French followed suit, and called them '^les lignes
pupinize.^^ These two new words coined in my honor
will last as long as the invention lasts, and so far there is
no sign that it will be superseded soon by some other in-
vention. Its simphcity and effectiveness give it much
vitality.

After the completion of my negotiations in Berlin, the
Siemens and Halske engineers took me to Vienna for the
purpose of introducing me to the high officers in the
Austrian Imperial Cabinet who guided the destinies of
the telephone system of the Austrian Empire. They were
glad, they said, to meet a native of Banat, a former sub-
ject of Austria, who had made so important an invention,
and they assured me that their policy with regard to it

346 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

would be guided entirely by the decision of the Berlin
experts. Vienna did not seem to have a mind of its own,
and all its thinking apparently was done for it by the
experts in Berlin. I was quite elated by the idea that the
Berlin experts who did the thinking for the Austrian
Empire had been most happy to spend a whole month
with me in daily conferences, eager to learn all they could
from me. I could not help exclaiming: ^'Oh, what a for-
tunate thing it was that in my early youth I ran away
from this moribund Empire, and landed in a country of
opportunities, where every individual thinks through
his own head and carries his load on his own back.''
Germany, at that time, was so vigorous that she did not
hesitate to do all the thinking and hustling for Austria as
well as for Turkey, and did not realize that she was carry-
ing around two corpses which could not be revived by
even the combined vitality of all the young and vigorous
nations, like the United States of America and United
Germany.

Before returning to the United States I visited my
sisters in Banat. One of them was Uving in Idvor. On
a Sunday in August during that visit I was dining in her
garden. There was a high fence around it, and not far
from it the boys and the girls of Idvor were dancing kolo
on the village green and the older people were looking
on. Presently somebody knocked on the garden-gate and
my brother-in-law opened it. There stood a rider, hold-
ing with one hand his horse, which was covered with foam;
in the other hand he held a telegram which he had brought
in haste from the telegraph station in another village,
about five miles away from Idvor. My native village
had neither a telegraph nor a telephone hne, although I,
its son, aspired to connect telephonically every person
in the United States to every other. The telegram in the
rider's hand was for me, sent by my attorney, telling me
that, on the day before, my final papers had been deliv-

IDEALISM IN AMERICAN SCIENCE 347

ered to the Marconi Company and that the check for
the final payments was in his hands. ^'Good news," I
said to myself, and gave the rider a tip of ten florins to
reward him for his haste, evidenced by the white foam on
his horse. The bagpiper and the kolo-dancers stopped
when they saw a ten-florin note in the rider's hand and
heard him brag that he had delivered to me a telegram
from America. The wondering crowd assembled at the
garden-gate, and the older peasants who had gone to
school with me in my boyhood days asked me if the tele-
gram really had come from America. When I said yes,
and that it had been sent on that very morning they
looked at each other and winked, as if signalling to each
other to be on guard lest I fool them with an American
yarn. Then the oldest one among them addressed me
as follows: ^^Did you not tell us that between here and
America there are four empires, each bigger than Austria,
and then the great ocean, which one cannot cross in less
than a week even in the fastest of ships?" ^^I certainly
did say that, and I repeat it now," said I. He added:
^'How can a telegram cross all that distance in less than
a day?" '^It could do it in less than a minute if man's
clumsiness did not delay it. It could travel from here to
Vienna in less than a second," said I, and carefully watched
his expression. The old man seemed undecided; he did
not know whether to take offense at my attempt to work
off a silly yarn on him, or to proceed with his cross-exam-
ination, and finally decided in favor of the latter course.
*'Who invented all that?" asked he impatiently. ^^An
American did it," said I boastfully. ^' These Americans
must be very clever people," said he and waited eagerly
for my reply. '^Yes, indeed, they are very clever peo-
ple," said I. '^Much more clever than anybody in this
village?" was his next question, and when I assured him
that the Americans were much more clever than anj^body
in Idvor, he fired at me the following shot: ''Then how in

348 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the name of St. Michael do you manage to make a lin-
ing there?"

This incident in my native Idvor did me a lot of good.
The experts in Berlin and the high officers in Vienna had
been most poUte and complimentary, and all their well-
meant adulation coming on the top of the newspaper
legends about my inventions might have turned my head
and made me imagine that I was a ^'wizard." Many an
inventor and scientist has been ruined by being per-
suaded that he is a '' wizard." I have always beUeved
that when a successful inventor is exposed to dangers of
that kind he should, somewhat like that king of an-
tiquity, hire somebody to whisper as often as possible
into his ear: ^'You are an ordinary mortal." Whenever
I see now the Elhot Cresson Gold Medal of the Franklin
Institute, the gold medal of the National Institute of
Social Sciences, the Edison Medal of the American In-
stitute of Electrical Engineers, the Hebert prize of the
French Academy, and several other evidences of recog-
nition in my possession, I always think of that professor
who blamed his hard luck for his failure to infer from the
loaded strings which hung daily over his head what I had
inferred from La Grange's imaginary string. It was, I
know, a lucky day when on the 14th of July, 1884, I
found that second-hand bookshop in the Quartier Latin
in Paris and picked up there a copy of La Grange's
treatise. Without it, I might have remamed as ignorant
of the remarkable properties of a loaded string as that
professor was. My answer to the peasant's question,
''How in the name of St. Michael do you manage to
make a living there?" is this: ''The humble herdsman of
Idvor and the famous La Grange of Paris told me how
to do it."

XII

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL

The mathematical problems in the theory of electrical
transmission, and the research of the behavior of ma-
terials employed in the construction of inductance-coils
kept me busy, and made me forget that I was missing
the splendid opportunities offered by New Physics, which
I always represented symbolically by the picture of a
vacuum-tube, because its origin dates from Roentgen's
discovery. My complete recovery from the shock of
1896 did not reconcile me to the vacuum-tube, until sev-
eral years had wiped out the memory which my mind
had associated with it. By that time I had dropped too
far behind the men who were leading in the procession
of the revelations which New Physics had disclosed to
man.

No sooner had Perrin, a French physicist, demon-
strated that the cathode rays were negative electricity
moving from the negative electrode of a vacuum-tube to
the positive electrode than Professor John Joseph Thom-
son, of the University of Cambridge, proved that this
negative electricity is concentrated in small corpuscles,
called electrons to-day, which move with great velocities,
and that the ratio of the electrical charge to the m.ass of
each electron is experimentally determinable, and is, under
ordinary conditions, a definite and invariable quantity.
This learned man, when a youth of only twenty-five, had
predicted in 1881, fourteen years before Roentgen's dis-
covery, that the cathode rays were small negatively
charged bodies, moving with great velocities. Assuming
them to be spherical, he calculated, by the Faraday-

349

350 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

Maxwell electromagnetic theory, the ratio of their charge
to their mass. He showed theoretically that their mass
consisted of two parts, one of which is the ordinary gravi-
tational or material mass, and the other a new mass which
is proportional to the electrical energy in the electron, and
that this mass also depended upon the velocity of the mo-
tion in a definite way. He devised and employed an ex-
perimental method to determine this ratio. The most
remarkable feature of this interrelation between the
electromagnetic mass and the velocity of motion was the
fact that when the velocity approached the velocity of
light the mass approached an infinitely large value. But
no such extremes of velocity of motion of the electrons in
a vacuum-tube were found at that time.

Becquerel, the French physicist, discovered, soon after
Roentgen's discovery, that certain substances associated
with the element uranium emitted electrons, both nega-
tive and positive, without being in a vacuum-tube and
submitted to the action of a great electrical force. Ma-
dame Curie isolated the most active of these substances
and called it radium. The action of electron emission
discovered by Becquerel was called radioactivity. Three
distinct things, it was found, were emitted by radium:
negative electrons, the so-called beta rays, some of which
were moving with enormous velocities; positive electrons,
the so-called alpha rays, moving with smaller velocities;
and, finally, an emission which had the same physical
properties as the X-rays. The beta rays, some of which
move with a velocity nearly equal to the velocity of
fight, enabled the physicists to determine experimen-
tally, employing J. J. Thomson's method, the relation be-
tween the mass of the electron and its velocity, and lo
and behold, it was found that, in all probability, the nega-
tive electron contained no other mass except the mass due
to its electromagnetic energy- In other words, a nega-
tive electron is concentrated electricity and nothing eist.

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 351

Similar experiments with positive electrons led to sim-
ilar conclusions. Another most remarkable result was
the revelation of the great difference between the masses,
and, therefore, between the electrical energies residing
in the negative and in the positive electron. The mass of
a positive electron was found to be very nearly equal to
the mass of a hydrogen atom, and the mass of a negative
electron was found to be only about one two-thousandth
part of the mass of the positive electron, and this meant
that if the electrons are of spherical shape then the
diameter of the positive electron is only one two-thou-
sandth part of the diameter of the negative electron,
since the energies and therefore the masses are inversely
proportional to the diameters. In other words, there
is in the positive electron a much bigger concentration
of electricity than in the negative and, therefore, much
more work was used up to produce that concentration.
Experimental data and calculation gave for the diameter
of a negative electron one ten-thousandth part of the
diameter of the smallest atom, that is, of the hydrogen
atom, and therefore the diameter of the positive electron
should be only one twenty-millionth part of the diameter
of a hydrogen atom. A most bewildering revelation !

The remarkable results of these historic experiments
forced, one may say, upon the physicist the electromag-
netic theory of matter, the theory, namely, that the ul-
timate components in the structure of matter are positive
and negative electrons. This theory was vaguely fore-
shadowed by Faraday in his poetic visions suggested by
his researches on electrolysis. Needless to say, the
physicists in the United States were thrilled by these
revelations, and by the new views disclosed by them,
perhaps even more than by the discoveries of the X-rays
and of radioactivity. The first visible effect of this thrill
was the organization in 1899 of the American Physical
Society, a quarter of a century after Tyndall's visit to

352 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

this country. Just think of it, the great United States
had no physical society prior to that time !

It is an interesting fact that two of the most important
American organizations in abstract science were started
at Columbia College. The first was the American Mathe-
matical Society. In 1888, two young instructors at
Columbia College, Fiske and Jacoby, started a mathe-
matical club. To-day the first is a professor of mathe-
matics, and the second is a professor of astronomy at
Columbia University. I joined them in 1889, as soon as
I had returned to Columbia. We transformed the mathe-
matical club into the New York Mathematical Society,
and elected for president the famous Columbia don, the
late Howard Van Amringe, for many years senior pro-
fessor of mathematics at Columbia College. Doctor
Fiske was its secretary ; no young and struggling scientific
organization ever had a better secretary. The society
prospered, and in 1894 it was transformed into the
American Mathematical Society, counting among its
members most of the distinguished mathematicians of
the land. I am certainly very proud that I am one of
its charter members.

In 1899 several Columbia physicists, including myself,
and their friends from Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Yale,
Princeton, Cornell, Clark, and other places, met at Co-
lumbia and organized the American Physical Society.
The late Professor Rowland, of Johns Hopkins, was
elected its president, and one of its most distinguished
members was Professor Ernest Rutherford, of McGill
University, Montreal. He is now Sir Ernest Rutherford,
the Cavendish professor of physics at the University of
Cambridge, occupying the professorial chair once oc-
cupied by Maxwell, then by Rayleigh, and then by
Thomson, now Sir John Joseph Thomson, master of
Trinity College, Cambridge. Their names I have men-
tioned often in the course of this narrative. It was most

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 353

unfortunate for the progress of American physics that
because of his failing health Rowland's wonderful in-
fluence in the society was of short duration. He died in
April, 1901, while still a young man. Rutherford's won-
derful discoveries in radioactivity were reported regularly
by himself at the meetings of the society, and I often
thought that these reports alone, even without the many
other good things which came along, amply justified the
existence of the society. When I compare the American
Physical Society of twenty years ago with the American
Physical Society of to-day I can scarcely believe that so
much progress has been possible in so short a time. I
recognize, however, that this remarkable growth is due
not only to the energy of youth of this country but also
to the energy of youth of New Physics, which I call
Electron Physics.

In October, 1899, Rowland delivered his presidential
address before the society at whose head he stood. I can
see now how happy he looked on that memorable oc-
casion. Inspired by the latest revelations in Electron
Physics, he prophesied what new revelations the physi-
cists should expect in the approaching future. After de-
scribing physics as '^a science above all sciences, which
deals with the foundation of the universe, with the con-
stitution of matter from which everything in the uni-
verse is made, and with the ether of space by which alone
the various portions of matter forming the universe af-
fect each other . . ."he stated frankly that the physi-
cists of America ^'form an aristocracy, not of wealth, not
of pedigree, but of intellect and ideals. . . . Let us culti-
vate the idea of the dignity of our pursuit so that this
feeling may sustain us in the midst of a world which gives
its highest praise, not to the investigator in the pure
ethereal physics which our society is formed to cultivate,
but to the one who uses it for satisfying the physical
rather than the intellectual needs of mankind." He then

354 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

pleaded that we '^ recognize the eras when great thoughts
have been introduced into our subject and honor the great
men who introduced them and proved them correct."
Then, enumerating the great problems of the physical
universe, he asked: ^'What is matter; what is gravitation;
what is ether and radiation; what is electricity and mag-
netism; how are these connected together, and what is
their relation to heat?" Now, these are the very ques-
tions which Electron Physics has been trying to answer
since that time; and this is the idealism which the Amer-
ican physicist has had before him ever since the days of
Rowland.

Electromagnetic theory of matter was the first answer
to Rowland's question: What is matter? But how about
the answer to his second question: What is gravitation?
If matter contains nothing but electrons, if they are really
the most fundamental building stones of matter, then
electricity as concentrated and stored up in the electrons
can exert in addition to the well-known electrical force
also a gravitational force. A somewhat novel idea, but
. . . why not, and why so ? Einstein gives the best an-
swer to this.

To Rowland's question: What is Ether? Electron Phys-
ics gave a puzzling answer, but the puzzle has led us
into a side path of surpassing beauty. Our famous
physicists, Michelson and Morley, are a combination of
two names better known in the world of physical science
to-day than Castor and Pollux were known when Zeus,
descending from the heights of Mount Olympus, sought
the companionship of mortal men. The fame of the
twins, Michelson and Morley, not, however, of Michel-
son alone, rests upon an experimental demonstration,
the importance of which was not until recently fully ap-
preciated, the demonstration, namely, that there is no
ether drift; that is to say, so far as man can tell, there is
no relative motion between the earth moving through

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 355

space and the ether which is supposed to fill all inter-
stellar space. On the other hand, the hypothesis that the
ether moves with the moving earth leads to insurmount-
able difficulties. This was, indeed, a most embarrassing
situation ! Since Michelson originally, and, later, Michel-
son and Morley, employed the radiation of hght in their
attempts to detect the ether drift, it became necessary
to re-examine the electromagnetic theory of propaga-
tion of light for the case that light, as in the Michelson
and Morley experiment, proceeds from a source which
together with the observer is moving through space.
The famous Professor Lorentz, of Leyden, Holland, whom
I have the honor of knowing personally, made the first
successful extension of this theory, and explained satis-
factorily Michelson and Morley's result. But the exten-
sion was obtained by what was acknowledged to be a
clever notion, and not by an unavoidable physical fact.
The same extension of the theory was obtained by Ein-
stein, but it was founded upon a broad physical principle
which Lorentz's extension lacked. Lorentz preferred Ein-
stein's deduction of his extension, called the Lorentz
transformation. The physical principle just referred to
is now popularly known as the Special Relativity Theory,
which Einstein extended later into the General Rela-
tivity Theory. Einstein's theory explains very simply
the Michelson-Morley experiment, but how does it an-
swer Rowland's question: What is Ether? Also very
simply by saying that ether is superfluous in our analy-
sis of physical phenomena. Faraday expressed a similar
view nearly eighty years ago. That, however, which is
essential in this narrative in connection with Einstein's
relativity theory is the great fact that by it a general
demonstration is furnished that all forms of electrical
energy are a mass which has ineriial as well as grauita-
tional activity. In the electromagnetic theory of matter
this demonstration plays a most important part. One of

356 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the schemes of this theory is so simple and so beautiful,
and appeals so strongly even to an imagination not
scientifically trained, that I must tell here very briefly
some of its most striking features.

All atoms are built up from a single atom, the atom of
hydrogen, which consists of a positive electron or proton,
the nucleus, and a single negative electron revolving
around it like a satellite around the central planet. A
heavier atom, say an atom of oxygen, consists of sixteen
atoms of hydrogen, the positive nuclei of which form the
positive nucleus or central portion of the oxygen atom.
Some of the negative electrons are distributed among the
positive electrons of the central nucleus, serving to cement
them together, and the other negative electrons are re-
volving like satellites around the central nucleus. The
number of these satellites is the atomic number of the
atom, and it is this number, and not the atomic weight,
which determines the chemical characteristics of the
atoms. This is only a mere glance into the structure of
Electron Physics, made here for the purpose of pointing
out some of the never-dreamt-of possibilities that Electron
Physics holds in view. For instance, four atoms of hydro-
gen combining into an atom of helium give off a certain
amount of energy. We say the atoms of hydrogen degrade
into the heavier atom of helium and, thereby, a certain
amount of energy is liberated. A helium atom weighs
less than four atoms of hydrogen, because of the dimin-
ished energy per atom of hydrogen, the decrement of the
weight being proportional to the decrement of energy.
This is demanded by Einstein's theory, which is really an
extension of the theory first proposed by Sir John Joseph
Thomson, and it is a remarkable fact that these weight
relations satisfy the prophecy of the theory. The amount
of energy obtained by the degradation of the lighter into
heavier atoms is enormous. But we do not know how to
produce the process of this degradation. The question

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 357

arises: Do not the young stars, the very hot stars, which
always consist of gases of small atomic weight, obtain a
supply of radiant energy from the degradation of atoms of
small into atoms of high atomic weight, and, if this is
so, then why shall we not some day learn this great se-
cret from the stars ? The language of the stars has many
deep secrets to tell; it mystifies me just as much to-day as
it did on the pasturelands of my native village fifty years
ago.

Many other most startling contemplations may be
connected with the new views opened up by Electron
Physics, all of them illustrating the beauty, the wealth,
and the power of a new science which represents the
marriage of two great sciences, physics and chemistry.

Industrial science is very much impressed by new dis-
coveries which, as Rowland expressed it, '^deal with the
foundation of the universe," but which in spite of their
revolutionary character are easily understood by the
practical man. Electron Physics abounds in discoveries
of that kind, and it seems that they have rushed upon us
hke a cloud-burst. Things have been done that formerly
seemed impossible. Take, for an illustration, a thing
which is so familiar to all, the complete transformation of
wireless telegraphy into the new art w^hich is called Radio.
A vacuum-tube with a hot filament fills up with negative
electrons, which are thrown off by the hot filament. The
filament may be said to be radioactive. A current can
be established by applying an electromotive force which
drives these negative electrons from the space surrounding
the hot filament to a positive electrode. Here we have a
new type of Crookes^s tube, operated by a small electrical
tension, and not by that of a powerful induction-coil,
which is necessary when the negative electrode is cold.
This current is called the thermionic current, and its
value can be varied in any way we please by a second elec-
trical force which acts through a third electrode, called

358 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the grid, placed in the path of the thermionic current.
This is the so-called audion tube, invented by a Yale
graduate, Doctor Lee De Forest. In the hands of the
Western Electric Company and of the General Electric
Company, this tube has transformed the whole radio art
by its amplifying power. My old inventions of electrical
tuning and rectification have been raised to unexpected
powers by the action of these tubes, and the inventions
of my former pupil and research associate, Major E. H.
Armstrong, and of others, have given us the broadcasting
art, which surpasses the wildest expectations of even the
rosiest of optimists of a few years ago. Wherever
Electron Physics has entered there have sprung up new
crops of the rarest fruit, and it is no wonder that there
are to-day so many workers in the newly discovered fertile
fields of the electromagnetic theory. Attend any meeting
of the American Physical Society and you will be con-
vinced that the research in the university laboratories as
well as in the research laboratories of our industries would
satisfy even the highest expectations of the men who fifty
years ago, under the leadership of Joseph Henry, started
the movement in favor of higher scientific research. The
university and the industrial laboratories are mindful of
Rowland's admonition: ''In choosing subjects for our in-
vestigation, let us, if possible, work upon those subjects
which will finally give us advanced knowledge of some
great subject." What subject can be greater than eternal
truth, and that aim, according to my definition, is ideaUsm
in science.

It is very true that our American scientific research
activities in physics and chemistry are so aUve to-day be-
cause they have been greatly stimulated by the wonder-
ful advances, through electron physics, in the electro-
magnetic theory, and in its very successful appHcations
to technical and industrial problems. But it is also true
that the scientific research activities in other branches.

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 359

like biology, which are not closely connected with the
electromagnetic theory and its applications, have also
blossomed up with wonderful rapidity during the last
twenty-five years. It will be conceded, I think, that all
these activities in abstract science are to a very substan-
tial extent due to the rapid rise of the American univer-
sity and to its splendid influence upon the mentahty of
our industries. But in this democratic country, cover-
ing a vast area, each State has the privilege of regulating
in its own way its own educational programme and pol-
icy, and each privately endowed university can pursue its
own ideals in its own way without worrying very much
about any other university. Lack of unity and uniform-
ity was, therefore, always felt, and there was always a
strong although often an unconscious desire in the hearts
of scientific men to bring about a uniformity in the aims
and aspirations of higher scientific research in our univer-
sities. The American Association for the Advancement
of Science made quite a number of efforts in this direc-
tion, but the progress was slow. The great World War
forced us to make another big effort in this direction,
and this time the effort succeeded beyond all expecta-
tions. The following story of this big effort is, I am
sure, of national unportance, and should be known by
every intelUgent person in the United States.

Just as the cultivation of science in the United States
was first taken up in the technical schools, like the School
of Mines of Columbia College, the Massachusetts Insti-
tute of Technology, and many others, and not in colleges
or universities, so the organization of scientific associa-
tions took place first among the engineers, the graduates
of the technical schools. The American Society of Civil
Engineers, the American Institute of Mining and Metal-
lurgical Engineers, the American Society of Mechanical
Engineers, and the American Institute of Electrical En-
gineers, for instance, were organized some time before

360 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

most of the present associations in abstract science, that
is in mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology were
organized. Even the youngest among the leading en-
gineering societies, that is, the American Institute of
Electrical Engineers, was organized in the early eighties,
whereas the American Physical Society was organized
nearly twenty years later, in 1899.

The organization of these technical societies did not
wait for the arrival of the American university. But,
nevertheless, when the American university arrived, and
with it the research laboratories in the fundamental
sciences, it improved the quality of the American engi-
neer, and of the Ajnerican engineering societies, just as it
improved the scientific standards of the American indus-
trial organizations. The National Academy of Sciences
deserves here a special consideration. It is an association
of workers in abstract science, principally, but, contrary to
what I have just said, it is, like the American Philo-
sophical Society, founded by Franklin, older than any of
our national engineering societies. Its early birth was
due to the conditions created by the Civil War. Joseph
Henry, I imagine, suggested to President Lincoln that a
mobilization of the scientific resources of the North would
improve greatly its military strength, and thus the Na-
tional Academy of Sciences was chartered by Congress
during the Civil War, in 1863, and was approved by Presi-
dent Lincoln. It was a creation of the Civil War, and is
in many respects an institution which forms a part of the
Federal Government. I shall describe now how the
National Academy of Sciences, itself a creation of the
Federal Government during the Civil War, gave birth
during the World War to another national scientific in-
stitution which is the climax of the great scientific move-
ment started fifty years ago. I have watched this move-
ment almost from its very beginning up to the present
time; yes, I have been a part of it during its most

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 361

active period, and I believe that I understand its full
meaning.

The four leading engineering societies, mentioned above,
were in quite a flourishing condition at the beginning of
this century; flourishing not only with regard to the
number, but also with regard to the quality of their
membership, and their progress was speeding on with
remarkable rapidity. For instance, the papers read be-
fore the American Institute of Electrical Engineers in
1900, and the discussions which followed them, were im-
measurably superior to those read in 1890, when I first
became a member of this Institute, because the quality
of its membership was also immeasurably superior. The
great American industries paid much more respectful
attention to these engineering societies than when I first
came to Columbia College in 1889. The greatest among
the American captains of industry of those days, the late
Andrew Carnegie, held them in so high an esteem that
he presented a magnificent gift to them which led to the
formation of the United Engineering Society. This hap-
pened in 1904, and marks one of the great events in the
history of American technical science.

It is of considerable historical interest to observe here
that Carnegie's magnificent gift to these national engi-
neering societies is closely connected with a very modest
move made by the American Institute of Electrical En-
gineers, nearly thirty years ago. The late Doctor Schuy-
ler Skaats WTieeler, at one time president of the American
Institute of Electrical Engineers, had purchased the fa-
mous electrical library of the late Latimer Clark, of Lon-
don, and had presented it to the Institute. But the In-
stitute had no building of its own, and, therefore, no
place for housing permanently this unique library. Sev-
eral of the members of the Institute, including myself,
were looking around anxiously for some practical scheme
which would provide the Institute with a home of its

362 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

own, where the Latimer Clark library could be perma-
nently located. It was obvious that Andrew Carnegie,
who was always interested in libraries, should be selected
as our first point of application. We never had to ap-
peal to anybody else; Mr. Carnegie was most generous.
The engineering societies appealed to his lively imagina-
tion. It was the engineer who assisted him in the devel-
opment of the great steel industry, and it was the engineer
upon whom he relied to maintain the American steel in-
dustry in the leading position which it had won, in a
great measure, by Carnegie's initiative and efforts. He
had already paid a splendid tribute to science for the
service it had rendered to him when he created and richly
endowed the Carnegie Institution of Washington, which
was to provide and does provide ample facilities to Ameri-
can genius in its efforts to solve some of the great prob-
lems in science. I mention here as an illustration the
endowment of the Mount Wilson Astrophysical Observa-
tory at Pasadena, California, an act which has borne mag-
nificent fruit under Professor George EUery Hale's direc-
tion. Instead of giving to the American Institute of
Electrical Engineers a building for a library, Mr. Car-
negie presented to the four national engineering societies
a building for their permanent home, with suitable ac-
commodations for a great library, for administrative
offices, for conference and meeting rooms, for lecture-
rooms, and for a great assembly hall. One of the objects
of the United Engineering Society was, according to its
charter, to hold and administer this princely gift ^^for
the purpose of advancing the engineering arts and sciences
in all their branches and for maintaining a free public
engineering library.'' The famous Latimer Clark electri-
cal library is now a part of this great engineering hbrary.
The four national societies represented by the United En-
gineering Society have a carefully picked membership of
over fifty thousand, and the magnificence of their home

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 363

on Thirty-ninth Street, near Fifth Avenue, New York, is
fully justified by their great prestige. I never look upon
this beautiful structure without being thrilled by the
thought that the treasures it contains in the form of
organized scientific achievement and brains are among
the greatest of the many rich assets of this nation.

Sixteen years ago, Mr. Carnegie and myself represented
the American Philosophical Society at the memorial ser-
vice for the late Lord Kelvin, the famous scientist. It
was held in the great hall of the Engineering Building.
As we sat on the platform, waiting for the conamencement
of the ceremony, I scanned the beautiful proportions of
the great hall, and they appeared to me more beautiful
than ever. ^'You must feel very happy when you look
at this splendid gift which you made to the Engineering
Society," said I to Mr. Carnegie, who sat on my right.
^'I do, yes indeed I do, and I hope that some day you
may experience the same feehng of happiness which
comes from giving," responded the great ironmaster.
^^ Perhaps I will," said I, ^^but remember that I am a
Serb, and not a Scot: it takes a Scot to understand and
to practise the art of giving." '^But it also takes a Scot
to understand and to practise the art of taking," said
Mr. Carnegie, and his vigorous eyes sparkled with the
hght of good-natured humor.

Another event occurred in the history of the four
founder societies which will always mark the beginning of
a new epoch in American science. Another captain of
American industry extended a generous hand to the
United Engineering Society, offering to aid it in its work
of ''advancing the engineering arts and sciences in all
their branches." It is very significant that this second
generous captain of industry was in many respects a strik-
ing contrast to the first, the late Andrew Carnegie. I
am speaking now of Ambrose Swasey of Cleveland, Ohio.
He, like Carnegie, started his industrial career with very

364 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

small training in technical sciences. What he knew
about engineering and manufacturing he had obtained by
practical experience. Ambrose Swasey is a splendid illus-
tration of a disciplined intellect trained by the training
of his hand. I have always believed that the most strik-
ing difference between the American and the European
is due to the fact that the American in his early youth
receives a much better manual training than the Euro-
pean does, and that this accounts for the American
directness of thought, judgment, and action. I never
saw a better illustration of this theory than Mr. Ambrose
Swasey. He began his career as a machinist, and when
a little over thirty years of age he and a friend of his, Mr.
Warner, another young machinist, started a manufac-
turing plant of their own, making fine machine-tools and
astronomical instruments of precision. The shops of
Warner and Swasey became famous all over the world
for their wonderful workmanship.

The American manufacturer has achieved great things
in mass production. This was Mr. Carnegie's strong
point; but Mr. Swasey did not belong to that type of
American manufacturer. His aim was few products but
each one of them as perfect as careful manipulation, per-
sonal attention guided by superior intelligence, and inven-
tive ingenuity, could make it. Most of the telescope
mountings of the great astronomical observatories in this
country were made in Mr. Swasey' s Cleveland shops.
His shop experience made him an engineer of a very
high order, so high indeed, that the American Society of
Mechanical Engineers elected him president, and, later,
honorary member. The charter of the United Engineer-
ing Society speaks of ^^ advancing the engineering arts
and sciences in all their branches," but there was no other
visible instrimientahty for doing that work than the free
engineering hbrary. Ambrose Swasey proposed to cor-
rect this deficiency when, in 1914, he offered to the

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 365

United Engineering Society a gift of two hundred thou-
sand dollars as a nucleus for an endo\\TQent the income
of which was to be used for ^Hhe furtherance of research
in science and engineering, or for the advancement in any
other manner of the profession of engineering and the
good of mankind. '^ These words, dictated by an Ameri-
can captain of industry, bear witness to the fact that there
is much idealism in American industry. The United En-
gineering Society accepted Mr. Swasey's gift, and estab-
lished the Engineering Foundation, which was managed
by its own board, the Foundation Board, nominated by
the four founder societies. Its members acted as trustees
of Mr. Swasey's gift and of any other gift that might be
given to the Engineering Foundation to serve a purpose
similar to that of Mr. Swasey's gift. This Foundation
became an instrumentality of the United Engineering
Society for the stimulation, direction, and support of sci-
entific research. It became, furthermore, the liaison
agency between the engineers on the one hand and the
technologists and scientists on the other hand, in activi-
ties concerned with research in all branches of mathemat-
ical, physical, and biological sciences. In other words,
one of the great captains of American industry, Andrew
Carnegie, was instrumental in bringing the great national
engineering societies together into the United Engineer-
ing Society, and another great captain of American in-
dustry, Ambrose Swasey, invented and by his generosity
constructed an instrumentality, the Engineering Founda-
tion, which he put into the hands of the United Engineer-
ing Society for the purpose of enabhng it to do the work
which its charter demands, ^^ advancing the engineering
arts and sciences in all their branches." I never think of
these two generous acts on the part of Mr. Carnegie and
of Mr. Swasey, without being reminded that these two
great organizers of American industry were guided by the
same motives of idealism which had guided the great

366 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

men of the revolutionary times when they organized the
United States. Read the charters of the Carnegie Insti-
tution, of the Engineering Society, and of the Engineering
Foundation, and you will find that no trace of materiahsm
can be found in the proposed scientific activities of these
institutions founded by two men who made material
things but never lost touch with the spiritual world
which gave direction and discipline to all their acts.

The Engineering Foundation became an operating in-
strumentality in April, 1915, and in a year from that time
it was called upon to engage in a scientific enterprise
which, in my opinion, has proved to be of the very great-
est national importance. In April, 1916, it appeared
that we were to become involved in the World War on
account of the sinking of the Sussex by German sub-
marines. The charter of the National Academy of Sci-
ences, passed by Congress and approved by President
Lincoln in 1863, provides that 'Hhe Academy shall, when-
ever called upon by any department of the Government,
investigate, examine, experiment, and report upon any
subject of science and art.^' The early records indicate
that during its very earliest days the National Academy
of Sciences, under the leadership of Joseph Henry, and
while the Civil War was still going on, dealt actively with
scientific research relating to military and naval problems.
It was, therefore, perfectly natural that, in view of the
threatening crisis, the National Academy of Sciences
should, in April, 1916, offer its services to the President
of the United States, who accepted them and requested
the Academy to organize the scientific and technical re-
sources of the country in the broadest and most effective
manner. This is how the National Research Council was
born. It is the offspring of the National Academy of
Sciences. The mother was born during the Civil War,
and the offspring was born during the World War.
Blessed be the country which even in times of war creates

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 367

institutions the highest aim of which is to cultivate the
arts of peace !

The members of the National Academy of Sciences are
elected on account of distinguished services to science,
and not on account of their cleverness as administrators
or organizers. The National Research Council was to be
organized for the purpose of ^'stimulating research in
mathematical, physical, and biological sciences, and in
the application of these sciences to engineering, agricul-
ture, medicine, and other useful arts, with the object of
increasing knowledge, of strengthening the national de-
fense, and of contributing in other ways to the public
welfare." The words just quoted are taken from Presi-
dent Wilson's executive order, and describe a splendid
conception. But from conception to reduction to prac-
tice is a long pull, requiring efforts along most practical
Unes of endeavor in which scientific men as a rule do not
excel. But it was very fortunate for the National Acad-
emy of Sciences and for the people of the United States
that among the scientists of the Academy there was one
man who had always displayed just as remarkable a
genius for organization as he had for original scientific
research; I mean Professor George Ellery Hale, director
of the Mount Wilson Observatory. Several other mem-
bers of the Academy, including myself, did our best to
aid him in the task of reducing to practice many of his
ideas relating to the National Research Council. There
was, fortunately, one thing w^hich greatly assisted our
earliest and most difficult efforts in behalf of this national
movement; it was the existence of the Engineering Foun-
dation.

My former pupil, Gano Dunn, was in 1916 the chair-
man of the Engineering Foundation, and I was one of the
two vice-chairmen. It did not cost me much effort to
persuade Dunn that one of the biggest tasks which the
Engineering Foundation could take up was to grubstake

368 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

the National Research Council during its formative
period. The Board of the Foundation accepted enthu-
siastically this suggestion, recommended by Mr. Dunn
and myself, and from September 1916 to September 1917
the administrative organization as well as the total in-
come of the Foundation was devoted to the organizing
work of the National Research Council. I am very
proud that during a part of that period I was the chair-
man of the Engineering Foundation, succeeding Mr.
Dunn, and had splendid opportunities to aid Professor
Hale and his committees in the historic work of organiz-
ing the National Research Council. Mr. Swasey was
very happy in this national work of the Foundation, and
he added to its income for that year a sum of five thou-
sand dollars as additional aid for its great undertaking.
At the expiration of that year, the National Research
Council did not need any further financial assistance from
the Engineering Foundation, but the co-operation started
in 1916 between the two national bodies continued and
produced splendid results; so much so that in 1918, dur-
ing my term of office as chairman of the Foundation, Mr.
Swasey added one hundred thousand dollars to his origi-
nal gift, and in 1920 two hundred thousand dollars more,
and the Engineering Foundation became the guiding and
controlUng factor in the activities of the engineering divi-
sion of the National Research Council. Mr. Swasey al-
ways hoped that others would follow his example and by
their generous contribution increase the income of the
Engineering Foundation to what it should be. This in-
stitution, as the directing instrument of the engineering
division of the National Research Council, could, with an
adequate annual income, say one hundred thousand dol-
lars or more, do a world of good in the research of our
great national engineering problems. I trust that Mr.
Swasey's hopes will not meet with disappointment, be-
cause his hopes are based upon his accurate estimate of

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 369

what the engineering profession needs. An estimate sup-
ported by the judgment and vision of a Swasey, and by
his generous financial efforts, should receive the most
respectful attention and warmest sympathy of our pub-
lic-spirited men.

It goes without saying that during the World War the
National Research Council was organized mainly with a
view to aiding the government in the pursuit of the war,
and for that purpose it was closely associated with the
government's scientific bureaus, and with the technical
department of the Army and Navy. This arrangement
is referred to, and receives the highest official sanction,
in the executive order issued by President Wilson, which
I quote now in full:

EXECUTIVE ORDER ISSUED BY THE PRESIDENT
OF THE UNITED STATES

The National Research Council was organized in 1916 at the re-
quest of the President by the National Academy of Sciences, under
its Congressional charter, as a measure of national preparedness. The
work accompHshed by the Council in organizing research and in se-
curing co-operation of military and civilian agencies in the solution of
military problems demonstrates its capacity for larger service. The
National Academy of Sciences is therefore requested to perpetuate
the National Research Council, the duties of which shall be as follows :

1. In general, to stimulate research in the mathematical, physical,
and biological sciences, and in the application of these sciences to
engineering, agriculture, medicine, and other useful arts, with the
object of increasing knowledge, of strengthening the national defense,
and of contributing in other ways to the public welfare.

2. To survey the larger possibilities of science, to formulate com-
prehensive projects of research, and to develop effective means of
utilizing the scientific and technical resources of the country for deal-
ing with these projects.

3. To promote co-operation in research, at home and abroad, in or-
der to secure concentration of effort, minimize duplication, and stimu-
late progress; but in all co-operative undertakings to give encourage-
ment to individual initiative, as fundamentally important to the ad-
vancement of science.

370 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

4. To serve as a means of bringing American and foreign investiga-
tors into active co-operation with the scientific and technical services
of the War and Navy Departments and with those of the civil branches
of the Government.

5. To direct the attention of scientific and technical investigators
to the present importance of military and industrial problems in con-
nection with the war, and to aid in the solution of these problems by
organizing specific researches.

6. To gather and collate scientific and technical information at
home and abroad, in co-operation with governmental and other
agencies and to render such information available to duly accredited
persons.

Effective prosecution of the Council's work requires the cordial col-
laboration of the scientific and technical branches of the Government,
both military and civil. To this end representatives of the Govern-
ment, upon the nomination of the National Academy of Sciences, will
be designated by the President as members of the Council, as hereto-
fore, and the heads of the departments immediately concerned will
continue to co-operate in every way that may be required.

(Signed) Woodrow Wilson.
The White House, May 11, 1918.

During the World War the National Research Council
was only partly supported by the government, although
it did exclusively government work. After the war,
however, the activities of the National Research Council
were reorganized without departing from the spirit of the
President's executive order, and its support was derived
from private sources only. Its organization can be de-
scribed broadly as follows:

It consists of two groups of divisions; one group com-
prises seven divisions of science and technology, repre-
senting, respectively, physics, mathematics, and astron-
omy; chemistry and chemical technology; biology and
agriculture; the medical sciences; psychology and anthro-
pology; geology and geography; and, finally, one of the
largest and most important of its divisions, the division
of engineering. The other group comprises six divisions
of general relations, representing foreign relations, go^-

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 371

eminent relations, state relations, educational relations,
research extension, and research information. In this
scheme of organization the National Research Council
enjoys the active co-operation of about seventy-five
major scientific and technical societies of the country.
It is, therefore, national in its character. It promises to
become one of the most precious assets of this nation,
and the nation should know much more about it than it
does.

The splendid work done by the Council even during
the first two years of its history attracted much attention
from the best men in the country, with the result that
the trustees of the Carnegie Corporation of New York
made a gift of five million dollars to the Council. A part
of this, a little over one-quarter, was to be spent on an
administrative building, the future home of the Academy
and of its offspring, the National Research Council. The
remainder was to be a pennanent foundation from the
income of which the administrative work of the Council
was to be and is now being supported.

The Rockefeller Foundation and the Rockefeller Gen-
eral Education Board gave the Council one million dol-
lars for the maintenance, during five years, of research
fellowships in physics and chemistry, and in medicine.
Other gifts came from philanthropic organizations, indi-
vidual concerns, and individuals, for the support of spe-
cial scientific projects, and more than a score of individ-
uals interested in the promotion of science contributed
two hundred thousand dollars for the purchase of land in
Washington on which the administration building of the
Academy and Council has been under construction dur-
ing the last two years.

Facing the Mall near the Lincoln memorial in Wash-
ington stands to-day, nearly completed, the administra-
tive palace of the National Academy of Sciences and of
its offspring, the National Research Council. The classi-

372 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

cal simplicity of its design and its snowy marble make it
appear at a distance like a Grecian temple. It will al-
ways invite the visitor to the nation's capital to its peace-
ful precincts, whence one can get the impressive view of
the beautiful monument to great Lincoln and of the
Arlington heights on the distant bank of the Potomac
River. When Lincoln and those buried on these sacred
heights died, the National Academy of Sciences was born.
The lives of these dead heroes of sixty years ago, as well
as the life of the institution born then and living to-day,
will always remind us that national defense is a stern
reality and the most sacred of our patriotic duties. Na-
tional defense is and always should be the uppermost
idea in the history of the National Research Council, but
national defense in its broadest sense, that is, defense by
powder and sword and scientific invention when a brutal
enemy attacks us, and by the stored-up accomplishments
of scientifically trained intellects and disciplined spirits
whenever this nation engages in peaceful competitions
with other nations.

The rapid rise of the Council into public favor is due
principally to its wise programime and to the standing of
the men and of the scientific organizations engaged in
the carrying out of that programme, the fundamental
feature of which is ^Ho promote scientific research and
the application and dissemination of scientific knowledge
for the benefit of our national strength and well-being. ''
This expression, often heard within the ranks of the
National Research Council, always reminds me of the fol-
lowing words in Washington's Farewell Address:

Promote, then, as an object of primary importance, institutions for
the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure
of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public
opinion should be enlightened.

In no branch of human activity does public opinion
need enlightenment so much as it does in the fundamen-

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 373

tals of science, and in their relation to technical arts.
One weak point in every democracy, particularly when
poorly understood and practised, is the belief among those
who control political patronage that any man can do any
job as well as any other man. The scientific man be-
lieves that a man must be trained for the job; hence his
profound respect for the expert. Nothing in his opinion
will advance our national strength and well-being so
much as' the ability of enlightened public opinion to dif-
ferentiate between the expert and the clumsy product of
political patronage. A motto of the Allies in the World
War was : make the world safe for democracy. But those
who are to-day associated in the National Research Coun-
cil believe that it is even more important to ^'make
democracy safe for the world" by the dissemination of
scientific knowledge for the benefit of national strength
and well-being. Many of us believe that this is the most
important part of the national defense, to which the
Council will always be pledged.

The National Research Council is not an organization
which operates scientific laboratories; it confines its atten-
tion to the stimulation of co-operation between scientific
workers, where such co-operation is necessary. This is
not the place to discuss in detail all the aims and aspira-
tions of the National Research Council and of the in-
strumentalities which it has created in order to reach
these aims. A survey, even a brief one, of the work of
the divisions belonging to the two groups of the National
Research Council will give some idea of these aims.
There are, however, two great aims which should be men-
tioned here, which have been well expressed by Doctor
Vernon Kellogg, Permanent Secretary of the Council and
chairman of its division on Educational Relations. He
describes one of them as follows: '^It [the National Re-
search Council] will try constantly to encourage the in-
terest of universities and colleges in research and in the

374 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

training of research workers, so that the inspiration and
fitting of American youth for scientific work may never
fall so low as to threaten to interrupt the constantly
needed output of well-trained and devoted scientific tal-
ent in the land.'' The other principal aim he describes
in the following significant words: ^^ Still another [assis-
tance to science] is the stimulation of larger industrial
organizations, which may be in the situation to maintain
their own independent laboratories, to see the advantage
of contributing to the support of pure science in the uni-
versities and research institutes, for the sake of increas-
ing the scientific knowledge and scientific personnel upon
which future progress in applied science absolutely de-
pends."

The appeal of the National Research Council to the
American universities and colleges in behalf of scientific
research will not be like a voice in the wilderness. There
never was so much enthusiasm for scientific research in
the American colleges and universities as there is to-day.
This enthusiasm will continually increase as time goes on,
because many of the scientific workers in these institu-
tions are gradually catching that enthusiasm during their
term of office as members of the divisions of the National
Research Council. Before very long most of these work-
ers will have served as such members, because the election
to membership is for a short term only, so that every
scientist in the land who wishes to serve will get a chance
to serve, and in this manner will become famihar with the
aims and aspirations of the National Research Council.
This rotational term of membership in the divisions of
the Council is a splendid method of carrying on the edu-
cational propaganda, particularly among the younger
scientists of the United States. Before very long the sci-
entists associated by service in the Council will be like
the soldiers of a great army of volunteers, each one of
them beUeving in and ready to struggle for the same

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 375

ideals, and all of them controlled by the same esprit de
corps, which the world will soon recognize as the esprit de
corps of American science.

With regard to the Council's second principal aim, de-
scribed so well by Doctor Kellogg, I am happy to make
the following comment: A distinguished lawyer, chair-
man of the board of directors of a large industrial corpo-
ration, which maintains a splendid industrial research
laboratory, said in my presence recently that he thought
every successful and prosperous industrial organization
should set aside a goodly portion of its profits from new
developments, made possible by scientific research, and
turn it over to the universities, to enable them to pay
better salaries to their professors and instructors in sci-
ence and to increase their research facilities. He con-
fessed frankly that the training in scientific research in
the universities is the fountainhead from which success
is derived in industrial research and development, and
that without industrial research American industries will
not gain and hold the leading position in the world to
which they may rightfully aspire. What a splendid thing
it is to hear a lawyer express an opinion which is in per-
fect harmony with the opinion of every scientific man in
the United States ! It has been this mental attitude on
the part of the American philanthropists and public-
spirited captains of industry like Carnegie, Rockefeller,
Swasey, Eastman, and others which has helped us to
accomplish wonders in scientific advancement during the
last twenty-five years. It has been men of this type who
have built research laboratories in the American univer-
sities and endowed them generously.

Of the many physical laboratories which have arisen in
American universities through private munificence since
the time when, fifty years ago, Joseph Henry, Barnard,
Draper, Andrew White, and other American scientists
started the great movement for higher research in sci-

376 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

ence, there may be mentioned, as an illustration, the
Johns Hopkins physical laboratory, the Jefferson labora-
tory at Harvard, the Sloan laboratory at Yale, the Fayer-
weather laboratory at Columbia, or the Ryerson labora-
tory at the University of Chicago. Similar research fa-
cilities in other departments of physical science have been
presented to American universities by the public-spirited
men of the United States. But nothing has illustrated
so well the possibihties of intelligent public interest in
and generosity to science as the rapid rise of organized
American science in the last twenty-five years, culminat-
ing in the organization of the National Research Council.
To an untrained eye, necessarily looking at scientific
things from a superficial view-point, the National Re-
search Council will appear as a splendid institution or-
ganized as our third arm of national defense, an indis-
pensable supplement to the Army and Navy. This con-
ception is perfectly natural, because the time and the
conditions which called the Council into existence during
the World War were such as to demand immediate scien-
tific efforts for national defense. Other somewhat similar
organized efforts were made at that time, but those or-
ganizations disappeared into thin air as soon as the
armistice of 1918 was signed. The National Research
Council did not disappear; it is stronger to-day than ever
before, because, although designed to be an effective
weapon in times of war, it is fundamentally an instru-
ment of peace. Another superficial view will reveal the
National Research Council as a splendid organization for
the cultivation of an intimate relationship between ab-
straeL science and the industries. This also is as it
should be; national defense in its broadest sense demands
such co-operation. But both these aspects of the Coun-
cil, prominent aspects to the superficial observer, reveal
only the purely material gains to accrue to this country
from the Council's activities. The anxious question will

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCH. 377

therefore be: What contributions will this organized
scientific activity make to the spiritual welfare of the
country ?

There are people who think that science with all its
splendid achievements is nevertheless materialistic, and
that it cannot by itself, no matter how well organized,
advance the spiritual welfare of a nation. Some even go
so far as to maintain that national endeavors in the direc-
tion of very extensive scientific research and very elab-
orate scientific training are apt to interfere seriously with
the spiritual development of our national Ufe. This is
particularly true of people who are stirred up, from time
to time, by imaginary conflicts between science and re-
Hgion. I may be permitted here to state briefly how
science, as I see it cultivated by the men who are asso-
ciated in the National Research Council, will contribute
to the spiritual welfare of our nation by describing briefly
some of its ideals.

Fifty years ago Tyndall, as I have already mentioned,
came to America and helped to start the great scientific
movement which has culminated in the organization of
the National Research Council. At that time Andrew
White, the famous president of Cornell, spoke the follow-
ing historic words in behalf of this historic movement,
which I have been watching since its very beginning, and
actively aiding whenever an opportunity presented itself :

Now, sir, I maintain that the true spirit of the scientific research,
embracing as it does zeal in search for truth, devotion to duty, which
such a search imposes, faith in good, as the normal and necessary re-
sult of such a search . . . that such a spirit is, at this moment, one of
the most needed elements in the political progress of our country.

What I maintain, then, is, that this zeal for truth as truth, this
faith in the good forever allied to the truth, this devotion to duty, as
the result of such faith and zeal, constitute probably the most needed
element at this moment in the political regeneration of this country,
and that, therefore, the example of our little army of true devotees
of science has an exceeding preciousness.

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Their zeal, their devotion, their faith, furnish one of those very-
protests which are most needed against that low tone of political
ideas which in its lower strata is political corruption. Their life
gives that very example of a high spirit, aim, and work, which the
time so greatly needs.

The aims and aspirations and the life of American scien-
tists have not changed since Andrew White spoke these
memorable words fifty years ago. A hfe guided by aims
and aspirations such as he describes is a hfe of saints and
not of ordinary materialistic clay. Such a life cannot be
attained without unceasing nursing of the spirit and unre-
lenting suppression of the flesh. Men of Andrew White's
clearness of vision will certainly tell you not only that the
disciplined army of American scientists mobilized under
the flag of the National Research Council will not inter-
fere with the spiritual development of our national life,
but that, on the contrary, nothing else will advance that
spiritual development so rapidly and so irresistibly. The
intellectual and spiritual disciphne which, according to
White, our nation needs, is certainly one of the ideals of
these men of science.

I shall mention now two other ideals. Just watch on
some summer morning how the early rays of the sun
arouse the slumbering rose from its blissful dreams, and
remember that the rose responds because its body and
soul are tuned to the melodies which the glorious sunlight
is pouring into its enchanted ear. Remember also that
what I have just described is not merely a flowery figure
of speech, but that it is a concise description of a beautiful
physical relationship, which science has discovered in the
life of the rose. I proceed a step further, and ask: Have
you ever feasted your joyful eye upon the beauties of
the landscape when on a golden May day you behold the
blossoming fruit-trees cover as far as your vision can
reach the velvety green turf of the numerous orchards of
some blessed countryside? TMiat does each of these

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 379

fruit-trees with its countless blossoms suggest to your
imagination? ^^The honey-hearted fruit of the mellow-
summer season," many of you will say. Yes, the blos-
som and the fruit are so far as the untutored mind can
see the beginning and the end of the short chain of ap-
parently commonplace events which make up the annu-
ally returning hfe activity of the humble fruit-tree. Who
cares what happens between so beautiful a beginning and
so satisfactory an end? The scientist cares; his trained
eye detects here an enchanting tale. Every one of those
fruit-trees on the golden May day appears to him like
a bride arrayed in the gayest of wedding raiment, wait-
ing for the approaching bridegroom. Its countless blos-
soms invite with longing lips the life-giving kiss of the
heavenly groom, the glorious sun. The bahny breath of
this golden bridegroom fills the air, kissing the lips of every
flower in the gay and festive orchards, and in the juicy
pastures and meadows. A heavenly thrill fills the hearts
of these enamoured blossoms, when, with sighs of dehcious
perfume, they, like blushing brides, respond to the tender
caresses of the heavenly bridegroom ! Yes, there will be
honey-hearted fruit in the mellow summer season; the
busy bee knows it when it sucks its honey from the
jo>^ul bosoms of the blessed brides; it knows that this
honey is the first message to you that the marriage
between the heavenly bridegroom, the golden sun, and
the terrestrial brides, the countless blossoms, will be
blessed with many a heavenly offspring, the honey-
hearted fruit of the mellow smnmer season.

This is, I admit, somewhat unusual language for a
scientist to use. It is, according to the opinion of many,
unsuited to the description of what people call the cold
facts of science. They call them so, but is their language
justified? The physical facts of science are not cold,
unless your soul and your heart are cold. There is white
heat somewhere in every physical fact when we decipher

380 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

correctly the message which it conveys to us. A physical
fact denotes activity, otherwise it could not penetrate
the depths of our consciousness. Activity is life, in the
broadest sense of this word. Death is cold, but life is
hot, and it is gross abuse of language to speak of cold
facts of science. It is such language that creates prej-
udice against science, representing its methods as well
as its results as devoid of everything which fires the emo-
tional side of man. Every physical fact has two ter-
minals; one is in our consciousness, and the other is in
some star which is rejoicing in the blazing vigor of its
youth. Just as the life activity of the early blossoms, and
of the honey-hearted fruit of the mellow summer season,
has its origin in the life-giving breath of the heavenly
bridegroom, the glorious sun, so every terrestrial activity,
every physical fact, with one of its terminals anchored in
our consciousness, can trace its origin to the life-giving
breath of some heavenly bridegroom, some burning star.
Just explore the path which leads from one of these termi-
nals to the other, and you will discover on each side of
that path those beauties which continually thrill the heart
of a scientific man. Do that and you will never again
speak of the cold facts of science.

Let me for illustration pursue one of these paths for a
little distance. Fifty years ago, when as a member of a
herdsman's squad of boys I watched the stars on the
black background of a summer midnight sky, I felt that
their Hght was a language proclaiming the glory of
God.

Has science changed that vision of the early childhood
days ? What does that light convey to my mind to-day ?
The answer to this question was born during my life-
time, and the gradual unfolding of its profound meaning
gave me the sweetest thrills of my life. Faraday and
Maxwell told me that light is a manifestation of the ac-
tivity of electrical force. The discovery of the Roentgen

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 381

rays and of radioactivity taught me that the primordial
sources of electrical force are the positive and the nega-
tive electrons, the electrons and the protons, the build-
ing stones of matter, and that light is radiation, that is,
propagation into space of the electrical energy from the
atomic structures in which the electrons with their mo-
tions determine the character of the structure and its
energy content. Then came Thomson, the same Thom-
son who scared me away from Cambridge, because I
thought that he was too young to be my teacher of
physics, and he suggested that the electrons possess an
inertial mass on account of the electrical energy which is
stored up in them. This suggestion led to the generaliza-
tion that all electrical energy has mass possessing not only
inertia but also gravitational action. Who does not know
to-day of this generalization, and who has not heard of
Einstein and of his verified prophecy that a beam of light
will be deflected by gravitational force? A beam of light
represents electrical energy and electrical energy is gravi-
tationally active just like any other mass considered by
Newton. A star radiating light radiates electrical energy,
and, therefore, it throws out to us a part of its own mass.
When this radiation reaches us we can say, therefore,
without indulging in figures of speech that the star is visit-
ing us. I am not indulging in a flowery figure of speech
when I call solar radiation the balmy breath of the
heavenly bridegroom, the glorious sun.

Fifty years ago, instructed by David's psalms, I found
in the light of the stars a heavenly language which pro-
claims the glory of God, but I did not know how that
language reached me, and I hoped that some day I might
find out. That hope was in my soul when I landed at
Castle Garden. To-day science tells me that the stars
themselves bring it to me. Each burning star is a focus of
energy, of life-giving activity, which it pours out lavishly
into every direction of the energy-hungry space; it pours

382 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

out the life of its own heart, in order to beget new life. Oh,
what a beautiful vista that opens to our imagination, and
what new beauties are disclosed by science in the mean-
ing of the words in Genesis: ^'He breathed into his nos-
trils the breath of life, and man became a Uving soul."
The light of the stars is a part of the life-giving breath
of God. I never look now upon the starlit vault of the
heaven without feeling this divine breath and its quick-
ening action upon my soul. But here I must stop. I
feel the heavy hand of the fundamentalist pulling me
down, and the icy chill of his disapproving voice reminds
me that his theology will not permit an interpretation
of the words of Genesis which cannot be understood by
people whose knowledge of science is about the same as
that of the Assyrians and Chaldeans of several thousand
years ago.

I have taken some pains here to point to some beauties
in one particular department of physical science. Such
beauties abound in every other department of science,
and they are in no respect inferior to those which form
the subject of the fine arts, like music, painting, sculpture,
and poetry. To cultivate the beautiful in science, is, ac-
cording to my view, the second ideal of the many loyal
workers associated in the National Research Council.
Will that kind of science interfere with the spiritual de-
velopment of our national life?

The third ideal may be described as follows: All
changeable things are subject to the play of evolution,
and are mortal, from the tiny flower in the field to the
awe-inspiring cloud figure in the heavens which is called
the nebula of Orion. But the laws which the stars and
the planets obey in their paths through the heavens
never change nor grow old; they are immutable, they are
immortal. The elements of the microcosm, the electrons
in the atom, are as far as we know immutable and im-
mortal, because man knows no natural process by which

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 383

the electrons and the laws which they obey can ever be
changed. They are not the product of any natural proc-
ess of evolution known to man. To discover the im-
mutable laws which this substantia, this immutable foun-
dation of the universe, obeys is the highest aim of scien-
tific research. The existence of these eternally unchange-
able things brings us face to face with a power which is
the eternally inmiovable background of all physical
phenomena. We feel intuitively that science will never
penetrate the mysteries beyond it, but our faith encourages
us in the belief that there behind the impenetrable veil of
this eternal background is the throne of a divine power,
the soul of the physical world, the activity of which we
contemplate in our research of physical phenomena. I
am sure that many loyal members of the National Re-
search Council believe that scientific research will bring
us closer to this divinity than any theology invented by
man ever did. The cultivation of this belief is certainly
one of the ideals of American science, represented by the
men who are associated in the National Research Council.
In the face of this ideal, there certainly cannot be any
conflict between science and religion.

I firmly beheve that in the National Research Council
we have an organization which represents the mobilized
scientific intellect of the United States, which in the pur-
suit of its lofty ideals will some day succeed in creating in
our democracy a profound respect for the services of the
highly trained intellect. A democracy which believes that
its destiny should be intrusted to the leadership of men
of training, discipline, and lofty aspirations and knows
how to secure the services of such men is a democracy
which is safe for the world. Such a democracy, I believe,
was the vision of the scientific men who, fifty years ago,
started the great movement for higher endeavor. Such
a democracy will lead some day to what I call ideal
democracy, that is, a state organism in which each human

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unit contributes its definite share to the physical and
mental activity of the organism. The relation of the
individual to the social body in an ideal democracy, as
I conceive it, will be very similar to the relation of our
cells to our body. Activities of individuals will be co-
ordinated, just as the activities of our cells are, so that
one composite mind will guide the resultant activities
of the whole social body. This is the mind which my
friend. General J. J. Carty, the distinguished engineer
and philosopher, calls the ^^supermind.'^ A well selected
name, because it suggests the name *^ superman" for
ideal democracy, and thus attaches to this somewhat
vague concept of recent years a definite meaning. The
general is a strong believer in the theory that by evolu-
tionary steps we are gradually approaching the state of
ideal democracy. He has Hved some forty years in the
most perfect industrial organization of the world, the
American Telephone and Telegraph Company, and,
naturally, he cannot help being an ardent follower and
enthusiastic advocate of the behef in the advent of ideal
democracy. But is there anything in the history of the
evolutionary progress of the world which justifies this
comforting behef? I think there is.

The Greeks of old beheved that the world started with
chaos, and that out of the chaos came the cosmos. They
were optimists, because in their theory coordination,
order, and beauty were evolved out of hideous disorder.
There are many pessimists to-day who prophesy the
opposite course of development of this, in their opinion,
most wicked world. Modern science confirms the ancient
belief of the Greeks in a remarkable manner. Nothing
else so resembles that chaotic start of the world which
the ancients conceived as does the activity of a young
star, because nothing more completely illustrates lack of
order and coordination. Each one of its pulsating atoms
is indifferent to the white-heat activity of the myriads

THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 385

of neighboring atoms, and each one of them pours out
its energy in an unconcerned and most prodigal manner
into the energy-hungry space. Consider our sun, as an
illustration. Tiny energy units are projected from
myriads and myriads of its atomic guns in haphazard
fashion, apparently without any definite aim. These
energy units are propagated through space in a perfectly
chaotic fashion, without a definite object in view so far as
science can tell. But their fate and destiny are fixed and
determined as soon as they arrive on mother earth and
are caught by the leaves, the blossoms, and the ripening
fruit of the fields, meadows, and orchards, and by the
endless nets of the all embracing oceans. The chaotic,
non-coordinated energy-swarms are thus imprisoned and
made to work together with a definite aim and for a
definite purpose. The joys and beauties of our annual
seasons will tell you the story of this wonderful trans-
formation of primordial energy from the chaos of the
young stars, white hot with joy of fife, to the cosmos of
the old, cold, and moribund earth. The principal lesson
of this story is the great physical fact that terrestrial
organisms have instrumentahties with which they co-
ordinate the non-coordinated, thus bringing the order of
old age out of the disorder of youth, final cosmos out of
primordial chaos. Is not the existence of these instru-
mentahties the fundamental guiding principle in the
development of terrestrial life? Does not all our experi-
ence teach us that progress means more complete co-
ordination of all natural activities, the activities of the
atoms in the burning stars as well as of the cells in our
terrestrial bodies? Call this progress evolution, or any-
thing else you please, it certainly is there, and it leads to
a more beautiful and a more perfect order of things. The
most nearly perfect product of these coordinating in-
strumentalities is man — after man, what? Yes, a super-
man: but what will that superman be ? The present maiv

386 FROM IMMIGRANT TO INVENTOR

TNE WHITE HOUSE

WASHINGTON

U^ dear Doctor Puplnj

I acoept with regret yea? resignation as a aefiW*
of the National Advieoiy Committeo for Aeronautics*
In doing so I want to eacpress to you the thanks of th9
Government and peqplo of the United States of your
services as a member of the National Advisory Comr
mittee for Aeronautics sines its.organizaUon in 1915«

1 take thl& occasion to reoord recognition and ap»
preciation of the fact that, as Chairman of the Suh*
committee on Aircraft Communications, during thd^Vorld
"War you undertook to develop a rellahle means of com-
munication tetween aircraft in flight, and that, "by
virtue of experiments conducted and directed in your own
laboratory, you were successful in contributing in an
important respect to the development of one of the great
marvels of our age, the radio telephone/

I regret that you cannot continue to devote your
talents to the scientific study of the problems of flight
as a member of the National Advisory Cooaaittee for Aero-
nautics*

Most sincerely yours.

/ /^^<rn-t^^^'^7^^^

Dr* Michael I. Pupin, ^

Columbia University^
Ifefw York City*

l^E NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 387

with his physical and mental faculties more highly de-
veloped?— or the superman as represented by what I
call ideal democracy? Carty, guided by his life experi-
ence and by the opinion of some biologists and philoso-
phers, favors the latter view. There certainly is some-
thing in the evolutionary progress of the world which
favors the view that the coordinating instrumentalities
which guide the activities of every organism, and which
are very powerful in man, may enable us some day to
find a way of coordinating the non-coordinated activities
of the many millions of individuals of a great community
like these United States, and thus of creating an ideal
democracy. I see in the organization of the National
Research Council the first step in that direction.

Ideal democracy, if attainable at all, will certainly be
attainable in our country, whose traditions are gradually
eliminating racial hatreds and suspicions and making
them unknown human passions on this blessed continent.
If I have ever contributed anything substantial to the
progress of this splendid movement, whether as an im-
migrant or as an inventor, it has been most amply re-
warded by the generous spirit of the letter on the oppo-
site page, written by a man whom I had the honor of
knowing personally and who to me always represented
the ideal type of a genuine American.

These few concluding lines I wrote on the day when
this good American breathed his last. His memory will
always encourage us in the belief that our blessed coun-
try is destined to become the first ideal democracy of
the world.

INDEX

Action and reaction in electricity,

296-299
Adams, John Crouch, 181
Adams, President, 315
Adelphi Academy, Brooklyn, 108-

110, 120
Alexander the Liberator, Czar, 8, 9
Alhazan, 204

Alps, travels in, 146-150, 208
Alternating-current theory, 283-

289, 294
American Association for the Ad-
vancement of Science, 291, 359
American Institute of Electrical

Engineers, 283, 337, 348, 359-362
American Institute of Mining and

Metallurgical Engineers, 359
American Journal of Science, 299
American Mathematical Society,

352
American Philosophical Society, 363
American Physical Society, 351-353,

358, 360
American scientific progress, 279-

384 et passim
American Society'of Civil Engineers,

359
American Society of Mechanical

Engineers, 359, 364
American Telephone and Telegraph

Company, 335, 338-340, 342, 345,

384
Americanization, 318 et passim
Ames, Joseph Sweetman, 256
Ampere, 187, 257
Appel, 257
Arago, 257

Archimedes, 193, 194, 221
Aristides, 92
Aristotle, 20
Armour & Co., 344
Armstrong, Major E. H., 19, 342,

358
Armstrong, Hamilton Fish, 316

Arran (island), 212-217

Aspern (battle), 6

Astronomy and Astrophysics, 293

Atomic structure, 356, 357, 384^386.

See also Matter, nature of, and

Electrons

Bacon, Roger, 204
Bagpiper, Serbian, 19 et passim
Baker's wagon, painting of, 62, 63
Banat, life and experiences in, 2-22,

95, 96, 152, 157-166, 324, 346
Barnard, President, of Columbia

University, 104, 128, 135, 183,

185, 197, 199-202, 205, 220, 230,

278, 290, 291, 320, 375
Barrett, Lawrence, 89
Batikin, Baba, 6-8, 12, 29, 46, 112,

131
Becquerel, 350
Beecher, Doctor Henry Ward, 105-

108, 124, 129, 136, 156, 163
Belgrade, experiences in, 153, 162
Belgrade University, 317
Bell, Alexander Graham, 299, 300,

319
Berlin, experiences and study in,

229-278, 309, 318, 338
Berhn, studies at University of, 229-

278, 318, 338
Bessemer process, 259
Bible, The, 10, 18, 20, 21, 67, 243,

245, 246, 381, 382
Bilharz, 85-95, 100-104, 106, 108,

112, 113, 130, 131, 140, 247, 318
Biscuit factory experiences, 72-76,

78-95
Bismarck, 247, 253, 261, 275
Booth, Edwin, 89, 129
Bowery Mission, 66, 67, 84
Bradley, 285

Brown (New Jersey farmer), 66-68
Browning, Oscar, 143, 171-173
Bryant, Wilham CuUen, 89, 93, 102

389

390

INDEX

Budapest experiences, 25, 30, 150-

152, 155, 162
Bukovala's mill, 168, 169, 243
Bull, Doctor, 307
Burgess, Professor, 128, 135
Butler, Prescott Hall, 307, 308
Butler, President Nicholas Murray,

60

Cambridge University, 143-146,

156, 164, 169-187, 190-211, 309,

318, 321, 338, 349, 381
Campbell, 187, 211, 213, 228
Canal rays, 304

Cane rush, Columbia, 114, 117, 118
Carnegie, Andrew, 259, 360-365, 375
Carnegie Corporation of New York,

371
Carnegie Institution of Washington,

362, 366
Carnot, Sadi, 186, 193
Carter, Mr. (of Norfolk), 328
Carty, General J. J., 384, 387
Castle Garden, 1, 2, 39-41, 43, 45,

98, 99, 104, 105, 142, 148, 278 et

passim
Cathode rays, 304, 305 et passim
Cavendish, Lord, 273
Cavendish Physics Laboratory, 183,

198, 199, 273
Cayley, 192
Centennial Exposition, Philadelphia,

78
Century Club, 308
Chanler, John Armstrong, 135
Charnoyevich, Patriarch, 3, 4
Chicago University, 376
Choate, Joseph, 288
Christian of West Street, 60-64, 72,

73, 80, 92, 104, 247
Christopher (kindling-wood ped-
dler), 111, 117
Chuchuk Stana, 54, 55
Church in Delaware City, 52; in

Brooklyn, 105-107
Cicero, 112
Civil War, United States, 315, 360,

366
Clark, Latimer, 361, 362
Columbia College and Universitv,

98-110, 112-123, 125-130, 132-

137, 145, 160, 161, 197-199, 201,

202, 218, 276-310, 320-322, 326,

331, 352, 359, 361, 376 et passim
Cooper, Peter, 77, 319
Cooper Union, 64-66, 73, 75-80, 95,

98, 130, 132, 319
Copernicus, 195
Cornell University, 377
Corrie, summer at, 212-217
Cortlandt Street cracker factory,

72-76, 78-95
Coulomb's law, 227, 228
Cracker-factory experiences, 72-76,

78-95
Crawford, F. Marion, 125, 143
Crocker, Professor Francis Bacon,

273, 279-282, 285, 286, 302, 310
Crookes, William, 303
Curie, Madame, 350
Custozza (battle), 7, 9

Danube, journey on, 23-25
Darboux, 257
Darwin, 91, 195
Davy, 202

Dayton, New Jersey, farm experi-
ences, 66-68
Declaration of Independence, 56, 75,

76, 78, 79, 98, 103, 153, 163
De Forest, Lee, 342, 358
Delaware farm experiences, 45-56
Democracy, 383-387
De Morgan, Professor, 176
Dennis, Doctor Frederick Shepard,

323-324
Dernburg, 69
de Tocqueville, 203, 204, 256, 319,

320
Devonshire, Duke of, 273
DeWitt, 121

Dindorf (philologist), 131
Direct current theory, 283-289
Discharge of electricity in corona

form, 293
Distortions in alternating current,

294
Draper, Doctor John William, 122,

202, 290, 291, 320, 375
Duncan, Doctor Louis, 289
Dunn, Gano, 292, 367, 368

Eastman, George, 375

INDEX

391

Eastman Kodak Company, 341

Ebert, 293

Edison, Thomas, 135, 299, 307, 309,

319
Edison General Electric Company,

287, 289
Eilers (of cracker factory), 72
Einstein, 354-356
Electrical Congress, Chicago, 287,

289
Electrical Engineering Department,

Columbia, 276-310
Electrical Researches (Faraday), 211,

213, 222-229
Electricity, passim
Electricity, 308, 309
Electromagnetic Induction, 133, 134
Electromagnetic theory of light and

matter, 211, 218-229, 236-241,

26^271, 278, 293-295, 303-306,

349-351, 354-358
Electron Physics, 353-358
Electrons, 349-352, 356, 357, 381
Enrniet, Devereux, 119
Engineering Foundation, 365-368
EngHsh, study of, 50, 55, 88
Ericsson, 78
Ether, 354, 355
Eugene of Savoy, Prince, 5
Evarts, William, 93
Evening Post, New York, 93
Evolution, 384-387
Ewing, General Thomas, 102
Experimental Researches in Elec-
tricity (Faraday), 211, 213, 222-

229

Farad (electrical unit), 273

Faraday, Michael, 133-135, 193,
195, 199, 202, 205, 210-213, 215,
219-230, 233-241, 243, 245, 246,
249, 264, 267, 268, 270-274, 278,
281, 284, 303, 305, 306, 349, 351,
380

Faraday as Discoverer (Tyndall),
235

Fayerweather Laboratory, 376

Fehispan, governor of Torontal,
161-164

Fish, Frederick P., 340

Fiske, 352

Fizeau, 257

Fluorescent screens, 307, 309

Foucault, 257

Fourier, 257

France, summer in, 187-189; visit

to, 257, 258, 262
Francis, Emperor, 5
Francis Joseph, Emperor, 9, 22
Franklin, Benjamin. 12, 13, 19, 29,

39, 45, 57, 74, 105, 124, 193, 202,

266, 312, 315, 360
Franklin Institute, 348
Fred (friend of Jim the engineer), 83
Frederick, Crown Prince, 233, 275
Frederick the Great, 5-7
French scientific progress, 257, 262
Fresnel, 204, 257
Frushka Gora (mountain), 24

Gabriel, son of Milutin, 165-169

Gaenserndorf, 25, 26, 28

Galileo, 193-195, 221, 297, 333

Gallatin, Albert R., 296

Garibaldi, 8, 9

Geltner, Professor, 275

General Electric Company, 289, 341,

358
General Relativity Theory, 355
Generators, electrical, 281, 282
Germans, 30, 31, 35; social democ-
racy, 89; scientific progress, 208,

256-264 et passim
Germany, studies in, 229-278, 318,

338
Gessler, 147
Ghiga (peasant), 161
Gibbons, Cardinal, 59, 60
Gibbs, Professor Josiah Willard,

184, 186, 207, 256, 257, 277, 278
Godfather of author, 160
Goethe, 86

Goldstein, Doctor, 303-305
Goodyear, 319

Graduation from Columbia, 136, 137
Grant, 79

Gravitation, nature of, 354
Green, Mr. (of Marconi Co.), 343-

345
Grounding, importance of electrical,

301, 302

Hale, Doctor George Ellery, 294,
362, 367, 368

392

INDEX

Hamilton, Alexander, 100, 101, 103,

107, 118, 121, 128, 193, 315
Hamilton, Duke of, 212
Hamilton Hall, Columbia Univer-
sity, 100, 101
Harding, President Warren G., 386,

387
Harvard University, 256, 376
Hayduk Velyko, 6, 54, 55
Hayes, 91, 93

Heat, nature of, 76, 185, 186
Heat as a Mode of Motion (Tyndall),

102
Heaviside, 333-335
Hebert Prize of French Academy,

348
Helmholtz, Hermann von, 193, 195,
200, 208, 210, 218, 225, 230-243,
248, 249, 251, 256-258, 260-264,
271, 275, 277, 287, 289, 294, 295,
298, 299, 303-305, 341, 344
Henry (electrical unit), 273
Henry, Frank, 114, 115
Henry, Joseph, 77, 183, 201, 202,
205, 220, 266, 271-274, 284, 290,
291, 319, 320, 358, 366, 375
Henry, Patrick, 88
Herdsman, experiences in Idvor as,

14-21, 301, 302, 333, 334
Hermite, 257
Herschel, WiUiam, 202
Hertz, Doctor Heinrich, 219, 221,

228, 263-272, 301, 305
Hertzian oscillator, 265-270
Hilendar (monastery), 70
Hittorf, 303
Hoffman, 263

Hohenzollern, William, 112
Homer, 86, 112, 130, 131
Hook, 334

Hoover, Herbert, 314
Horace, 87

Horse training in Norfolk, 324-326
Howe, 77

Hunt, Robert, 102, 130
Huss, Yan, 33

Hutchinson, Doctor Gary T., 337
Huxley, 91

Idealism in American science, 311-

384
Idvor, life and experiences in, 2-22,

34, 36, 138-143, 156-169, 189-191,
215, 242-248, 301, 302, 346
Inductance coils, 335-342, 345
Induction, Electromagnetic, 133, 134

Jackson, A. V. Williams, 275, 276

Jacoby, 352

Jay, John, 100, 101, 103, 107, 121,
143, 315

Jefferson, Thomas, 74, 315

Jefferson physical laboratory. Har-
vard, 256, 376

Jim (boiler-room engineer), 74-76,
78-85, 92, 95, 104, 106, 108, 130,
193

Johns Hopkins University, 59, 60,
183, 184, 198, 199, 288-292, 376

Karageorge, 6-9

Karlovci, 23, 24, 26, 30, 57, 68, 77,
97, 153-155, 162

Kellogg, Doctor Vernon, 373, 375

Kelvin, Lord (Sir William Thom-
son), 182, 183, 266, 287, 304, 332,
333, 335, 338, 363

Kepler, 204

Kessedjia, Moussa, 115

Kirchhoff, Gustav Robert, 204, 233,
258, 261, 263, 332, 333, 335, 338

Koenig, Professor Arthur, 230-232,
234, 235, 240, 241, 248, 249

Kos (Slovenian teacher), 19-21, 32,
76, 95, 241, 244, 266, 312

Kossovo (battle), 7, 54

Kossuth, 163

Krupp, 259

Labor Bureau, Gastle Garden, 40, 41

La Grange, 187, 189, 190, 193, 194,
204, 206, 207, 210, 213, 257, 330,
331, 335, 338, 339, 348

Lansing, Robert, 2

Laplace, 187, 257

Lectures given for laboratory equip-
ment, 280, 281

Lenard, Professor, 305

Leopold I, Emperor, 3, 4

Life of Maxwell (Campbell), 187

Light, nature of, 19-21, 133, 144,
166, 171, 201, 202, 211, 218-221,
240, 244, 271

Lincoln, Abraham, 8, 9, 29, 39, 55,

INDEX

393

74, 79, 92, 105, 107, 193, 315, 319,

360, 366, 372
Lines of force, 226-230, 236-240,

265-271
Ling (of King's College choir), 172
Lippmann, 257
Livingston, Chancellor, 100, 101,

103, 107, 121, 137
Longfellow, Henry W., 87, 102, 149
Lorentz, Professor, 355
Low, President, 307, 331
Lucerne experiences, 146-150
Lukanitch family, 95-99, 105, 106,

116, 136
Lyermontoff (poet), 18
Ljaibomir, 168

Macmillan homestead, Corrie, 216,
217

Macnamara, Jane, 82, 86

Madge of Corrie, 213, 214, 216

Magnetism, 218-229

Marconi, 301, 302

Marconi Company of America, 343-
345, 347

Maria Theresa, Empress, 5

Marko, Prince, 8, 9, 29, 46, 54, 55,
115, 195

Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology, 359

Matter, nature of, 218-221, 354.
See also Electrons, Atomic struc-
ture, etc.

Matter and Motion (Maxwell), 179,
185, 193

Maxwell, James Clerk, 133-135,
144, 145, 153, 166, 171, 174-176,
179-181, 183-187, 190, 193-195,
197, 198, 200, 201, 204, 206, 208,
210-214, 217-222, 229, 234-243,
249, 256, 264, 267, 270-274, 278,
284, 303, 305, 306, 320, 321, 350,
352, 380

Mayo-Smith, Professor Richmond,

128
McCormick, 77, 319
McCullough, John, 89
Mechanique Analytique (La Grange),

189, 193
**Men of Progress" (painting), 77,

78, 130, 319

Merriam, Professor, 128. 131, 134,

135, 143
Michael (college janitor), 114
Michelson, 354, 355
Miletich, Svetozar, 21, 22

Milton, 102

Moltke, 253, 261, 262, 275

Momentum in electricity, 297, 298

Morley, 354, 355

Morse, 77, 319

Motion, electric (in rarefied gases),
303-306

Moula Pasha, 6

Mount Wilson Astronomical Ob-
servatory, 294, 362, 367

Mueller (glass-blower), 303, 304

Napoleon, 5-7

Nassau Hall, Princeton, 69, 72, 84,
87, 88, 99, 101, 103

National Academy of Sciences, 205,
272, 360, 366, 367, 369

National Institute of Social Sci-
ences, 339, 348

National Research Council, 317,
366-383, 387

NaturaHzation, 136, 137

Nature, 192, 200, 201, 205, 206, 208,
221, 236

Nemanya, Zhupan, 10

"Neptune, Father," 139-142

Nettleton, Mr. (of Norfolk), 327-
329

New England Cracker Factory, 72-
76, 78-95

New Physics, 349, 353-358

New York, landing in, 37-42

New York Academy of Sciences, 309

New York Mathematical Society,
352

New York Rapid Transit Commis-
sion, 289

Newton, 174, 177, 179, 180, 186,
193-196, 204, 210, 211, 221, 225,
282, 283, 296, 334, 381

Niagara Falls Power and Construc-
tion Company, 287, 288

Nikola (Serbian cigarette seller),
252-254, 258, 274^276

Niven, W. D., 143-146, 156, 171,
174-176, 178, 180, 181, 186, 197,
240

394

INDEX

Norfolk, Conn., life at, 322-329
Nyegosh, Bishop (poet), 20, 68, 112

Octagon class, 119, 121
Oerstedt, 221, 224
Osborn, Henry Fairfield, 71
Oscillator, Hertzian, 265-270, 301,

302
Oxen herding in Idvor, 14-21, 301,

302, 333, 334

Palacky, 31-33

Panchevo, experiences in, 12, 20-24,

29, 31, 35, 154-156, 163, 312-318
Paris peace conference, 2, 312, 314.

315
Parkinson, Stephen, 182, 183
Parsons, William Barclay, 286
Pashitch, Premier, 312
Paul (of the cracker factory), 79, 80
Penn, WiUiam, 45, 57
Perrin, 349
Philadelphia, early experiences in,

56, 57
Phonograph, 299, 300
Physical Society, Berlin, 263-271
Physics, New and Electron, 349,

353-358
Pickernell, Mr., 335
Planck, 261, 277
Plea for Pure Science, A (Rowland),

291
Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, 105-

108, 129
Poetry of Science, The (Hunt), 102
Poincar6, 257

Pornic, vacation in, 187-189
Power distribution, electrical, 289
Practical Aspects of the Alternating

Current Theory (Pupin), lecture,

283, 284
Prague, experiences in, 21-35, 163,

164, 248
Preceptorial system in college, 326
Princeton University, 69-72, 84, 87,

101, 143, 272, 316, 326
Privilegia (document), 4, 5, 9
Problems of physical universe, 354
Prussians, 247-255. See also Ger-
mans
Pupin coil, 335-342, 345

Pupin, Constantine (father of au-
thor), 2, 21-23, 34, 158

Pupin, Mrs. Michael, 276-278, 292,
310, 322, 330-332

Pupin, Olympiada (mother of au-
thor), 2, 10-12, 22, 23, 34, 157-
160, 168, 169, 190, 191, 215, 242-
246, 249-251, 255

Pyne, Moses Taylor, 69

Radichevich, Branko, 154

Radio, 295-299, 303, 342, 343, 357,

358
Radioactivity, 350, 351, 381
Radium, 350
Rayleigh, Lord, 144, 175, 176, 181,

184, 197, 213, 240, 330, 352
Regnault, 182
Relativity theories, 355
Research, progress of America in,

279-384
Resonance, 295-299
Resonators, electrical, 295-301
Reymond, DuBois, 258, 263
Rieger, 31-33
Rittenhouse, 202
Rives, George, 143
Rives, Reginald, 326
Rockefeller, John D., 375
Rockefeller Foundation, 371
Rockefeller General Education

Board, 371
Roentgen, 305, 306, 349, 350
Roentgen rays, 302, 303, 305, 329,

349, 380. See also X-rays
Rood, Professor, 133, 134, 199
Routh, Doctor John Edward, 174-

180, 182, 185-187, 189, 197, 213
Rowland, Henry Augustus, 183,

184, 256, 287-292, 295, 298, 299,

352-354, 357, 358
Royal Serbian Academy, 317
Rumford, Count (Benjamin Thomp-
son), 202, 218
Rutherford, Sir Ernest, 352, 353
Rutherford Park, N. J., summer at,

111-113
Rutherfurd, Lewis, 122
Rutherfurd, Lewis Morris, 122-129,

133-135, 144
Rutherfurd, Winthrop, 122-126, 144
Ryerson Laboratory, 376

INDEX

395

St. Sava, 10-12, 33, 35, 68, 70, 77,
141, 158, 250

School life in Idvor, 10-12; in Pan-
chevo, 12

Science, 309

Scientific American, 74

Scientific progress and research,
202-206, 218-230, 256-264, 279-
310, 311-384 et passim

Scientific research, American prog-
ress in, 279-310

Scientific research and the universi-
ties, 341-343, 358-360, 375, 376

Scotland, summer in, 212-217

Serbian Child Welfare Association
of America, 312

Serbs, 1-28, 151-168 et passim

Shakespeare, 86, 89, 129

Shepard, Doctor Charles, 108-111,
136

Siemens, Ernst Werner von, 260,
275, 289, 344

Siemens and Halske, 344, 345

Signalling by herdsmen of Idvor,
15-21, 301, 302, 333, 334

Sing Sing prison, 284, 287

Singers, Serbian, 155

Sloan Laboratory, 376

Smith, Professor Monroe, 128

Smithsonian Institution, 272

Snclhus, 204

Sobiesky, King, 3

Solar corona, 293

Solar phenomena, electromagnetic
theory of, 293, 294

Sorbonne, the, 257

Sound, early herdsman's experi-
ments, 15-21, 301, 302; transmis-
sion, 333

South St. Mary, Md., 58

Special Relativity Theory, 355

Sprague, Frank J., 287

Steel industry, German, 259

StillweU, Lewis B., 287

Stokes, Sir George Gabriel, 175, 181,
192, 197, 204, 213, 240

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 39, 105

Strazhilovo, Will, 162

Subways, 289

Summary and Conclusions (Tyndall),
204-208

Sun, New York, 74, 93, 94

Swasey, Ambrose, 363-365, 368,

369, 375
Swift Company, 344
Switzerland, experiences in, 146-

150, 208, 330, 331

Telegraphy, 234, 300, 347, 348

Telephony, 299, 300, 331-342, 345-
348

TeU, William, 147

Tendencies of Modern Electrical Re-
search (Pupin), 309

Tesla, 285

Theory of Heat (Maxwell), 185, 193

Theses for doctor's degree, 277

Thomas, Sidney Gilchrist, 259, 260

Thompson, Benjamin (Count Rum-
ford), 202, 218

Thomson, Ehhu, 284, 286, 287, 289

Thomson-Houston Company, 287,
289

Thomson, Sir John Joseph, 198, 292,
293, 306, 349, 350, 352, 356, 381

Thomson, Sir William (Lord Kel-
vin), 182, 183, 266, 287, 304, 332,
333, 335, 338, 363

Tilden, 91

Tilton, 105

Tolstoy, 152

Traction, electrical, 286, 287

Traditions, 104, 105, 120, 121

Transactions of the American Iiisii'
tute of Electrical Engineers, 299

Transmission and motion of elec-
tricity, 287, 303-306

Tribune, New York, 91

Tuning, electrical, 19, 295-299.
See also Radio.

Tyndall, John, 102, 130, 132, 186,
199-213, 220-222, 230, 235, 236,
240, 283, 291, 321, 351, 377

Tyndall Fellowship, 199, 209

Uncle Tom's Cabin (Stowe), 29, 39,

105, 156
United Engineering Society, 361-

365

Vacuum tubes, 303-306, 349, 357,

358
Van Amringe, Professor Howard,

128, 352

396

INDEX

Van Nostrand Magazine, 179

Vaschy, 333-335

Velocity, electrical, 234

Vibratory motion, transmission of,
330-338

Vienna experiences, 97, 150-152,
154, 155

"Vila" of Delaware farm, 47-58, 80,
88

Vila Raviyoyla, 195

Vitellio, 204

Vreeland, Mr. (inventor of oscilla-
tor), 19

War, World, 312, 315, 316, 333,

334, 344, 359, 360, 366, 369-371,

376
Warner, Mr., 364
Warner and Swasey shops, 364
Washington, George, 54, 55, 100,

137, 193, 315, 372
Washington, Martha, 54
Watt, James, 75
Webster, Arthur Gordon, 255-257,

308
Webster, Daniel, 88, 315
Webster, Professor at Adelphi

Academy, 108, 109
Welch, Professor William, 184
Western Electric Company, 340, 358
Westinghouse Company, 284, 341

Westphalia (ship), 35-39, 138
Wheeler, Doctor Schuyler Skaats,

361
White, Andrew D., 203, 220, 274,

320, 375, 377, 378
Widener, Mr., 326
WilHam I, Emperor, 252, 275
Wilson, President Woodrow, 2, 71,

313-315, 367, 369, 370
"Wilson Day" in Panchevo, 312-

318
Wireless, 295-299, 303, 342, 343,

357, 358
Worcester Gazette, 308
World War, 312, 315, 316, 333, 334,

344, 359, 360, 366, 369-371, 376

X-rays, 305-310, 330, 332, 350, 351.
See also Roentgen rays.

Yale University, 184, 185, 376
Yevrosima (mother of Prince

Marko), 54, 195
Youmans, 320

Young, Professor Charles A., 293
Young, Thomas, 204

Zhivkovich, Protoyeray, 20, 22, 31.

32, 156, 316
Zhizhka (general), 33

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